LONDON DOCKLANDS Volleyball head into the Christmas break on the back of two successive defeats. Having gone down in a lacklustre performance to Malory Eagles last week, they succumbed to London Polonia on Saturday three sets to one in a close-fought enco

LONDON DOCKLANDS Volleyball head into the Christmas break on the back of two successive defeats.

Having gone down in a lacklustre performance to Malory Eagles last week, they succumbed to London Polonia on Saturday three sets to one in a close-fought encounter.

Ian Legrand's men are now third in Men's National League Division One, six points behind leaders Sheffield.

Both teams started nervously at Bacon's College and set one was littered with errors on offense and from the service line.

It was Polonia though who found their rhythm first and went on to take the first set.

The nerves evaporated in set two and Docklands' Mo Sliti and George Uzunov seemed to have decided to try to win the game on their own and were unstoppable with their power and range through the outside position.

In a tense set, Legrand called his second time out at 23-22.

The crowd held its breath, but they needn't have panicked - with a trademark angled smash through position four, Sliti sealed the set for Docklands.

Legrand's troops will wonder how they lost the match from this point. In the ascendency they surged to a 14-9 lead in set three off the back of serves from Di Bella, Halatchev and Sliti.

But Polonia plugged away and after levelling the scores they won a dramatic set 26-24.

In the fifth and deciding set Docklands were 18-13 up and cruising, but managed to contrive to find themselves 22-18 down and from there the visitors went on to claim their first away win of the season.

Docklands return to action in the cup against Division Three opponents New Forest on January 9.

They couldn't ask for a bigger incentive to win that tie - a quarter final and a rematch against London Polonia.