Up-To-Date: Haikyuu 296

Because I was so late with my previous post, here I am with the earliest UTD post I am able to do! Yaaaay! I love the title page here! It features our three adorable players.

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The chapter starts with Asahi and Nishinoya’s chest bump. (I bet the AsaNoya fans are rejoicing!) It’s just amazing how Noya is able to do this with Asahi, bigger and heavier as he is. Though it may be that Asahi’s not using much force.

Anyway, the commentators commended Noya with his skills. From the start, it has been clear that Noya has genius skills much like Kageyama. As someone like that with an enthusiastic personality and a team like Karasuno, I guess it can’t be helped that Noya tries skills outside his “specialty”. The team is continuously evolving and I doubt Noya will allow himself to be left behind by everyone.

On the other note, this reminds me of Watari Shinji, Seijoh’s libero who Noya learned that toss from. He was previously a setter. Though we don’t know his motivations as to why he changed to be a libero, I think it’s admirable that he didn’t limit himself. Not that receiving skills isn’t something that the other players shouldn’t focus on, though. If the others aren’t even good at it, there won’t be a game at all.

Anyway, Ogano reminds us of how Noya wasn’t even able to do that move before. How he worded it (or at least the translator from MS) is amusing! Really, Noya has improved a lot since then. He was jumping too short or too long, tossing at the verge of dribbling, tossing a bit to low, and the likes. It’s always great to be reminded that geniuses may be good, but they’re not always like that; they still practice a lot which makes them perform better than they did before.

Moving on, Tanaka serves and Kai is able to receive it, though he tossed it a bit short to Kenma. Kenma glances at Taketora and Hinata almost got himself trapped by his trick.

Good thing he listens to Kageyama. Though I think I’d like it more if it came from Tsukki as he was the one we saw Kenma clearly baited before. Nevertheless, I love how Hinata is able to restrain himself from going after that feint.

I think it’s really going to be a challenge for Karasuno to deal with Nekoma’s offense mostly because of Kenma since he is a setter with minimal giveaway movements as Akaashi observed.

The crows are going to need to have a proper countermeasure for what the cats could pull off. I think it will be great to see Tsukki being able to come up with a plan against them. Oh, and Kageyama looks so amusing with that look of accusation. But it’s true that it couldn’t be helped! Hahaha!

This chapter actually really has a lot of Kenma! I think this performance from him speaks of just how much hyped up he really is because it’s finally the promised day between him and Hinata.

Then back to the game when Asahi spikes and Kenma receives it and the ball goes over the net. Hinata spikes it and Yaku saves it, but it’s obvious that Yaku wasn’t satisfied with the way he received the ball. It went over the the Karasuno court and Asahi hits it but Taketora gets it. Kenma then follows up.

It seems like Nekoma is staying as who they are. Calm and calculating. They may not do flashy plays now, but I have this feeling that they’re bound to surprise us.

Anyhow, Asahi gets to attack again and this time he succeeds making the score 2-3 in favor of their team!

Indeed, Karasuno’s on a roll. Seems like they are leading. But it’s still Nekoma they have as a rival. Akaashi thinks that Nekoma will be screwed if they’ll be left behind in points, but I don’t think that will happen. As they are now, even when they are still starting, cooking things up to fight against Karasuno, they’re already not letting the crows lead by so much as a one point. When Nekoma plays, they lay out plans which gradually sees the light later in the games. I feel like it’s the same in this game. They may look like they are getting behind, but I feel like they’re just slowly but surely executing their plan.

Or maybe I’m being like Akaashi, overthinking these things. Anyway, I love how Bokuto made a mistake about Asahi’s name! Oh, my dear owl, you’re so adorable! Hahaha! And Akaashi’s so occupied with his thoughts that he didn’t even get to correct him.

AAAAND FINALLY! It’s Tsukki! With Kenma’s setting, Tsukki’s skills and wit will surely be challenged and put to use. Anyway, I love how Mika is learning from everything Daishou says regarding volleyball. And this panels actually made me want to see a Nohebi vs Karasuno match! Too bad that Daishou won’t be able to play any official matches since it’s his last year in high school. But a Daishou-Tsukki clash sounds interesting to see!

I love these panels, too! Two of my beloved characters! So different yet both so loveable! Kenma’s face and Tsukki’s thought are hilarious! I’m so excited to see the plays these two will make for the team!

Nekoma wants to win and they won’t just stand to receive the balls. They are ready to attack, too. And their next move actually surprised a lot of people. And I WAS SURPRISED, TOO, OF COURSE!

Who wouldn’t be? It’s a synchronized attack! From the start, we only saw three teams do it — 1) Shinzen High which is where Karasuno actually got to know it, 2) Karasuno, of course, and 3) Johzenji High which impulsively copied Karasuno and failed at first while the second time cost them their chance to advance.

I was surprised because even if we saw them play against Fukurodani, Nohebi, and Sarukawa Tech, they didn’t do any synchronized attacks. Unless they did it, but Furudate-sensei took the liberty not to show it. In any case, I’m curious of how they came up to the decision to do them and when they started doing it. Did they prepare it as a counter for Karasuno? Is this done a bit on impulse? Like, are they playing mind games with Karasuno? Tricking them to think that they will do many of these, even if they didn’t really practice this very much?

If it’s not on impulse, they might have been practicing these after the qualifiers for Nationals because even if they struggled against Fukurodani and Nohebi, they didn’t do it. Plus, Akaashi and Bokuto are surprised so this must be the first time they saw this. I feel like they didn’t actually do this for their games against Kiyokawa and Sarukawa Tech, too, because had they done so, I think Karasuno would have known. I feel like they’ll be able to hear something about it.

So, this might be something they are practicing for during that break before Spring High. This game against Karasuno might be when they decided that it’s finally the time to use it on an official match.

Or I don’t know. I’m just so excited to see how this will all go! For all we know, they might also fail doing it. But I hope they won’t. AAAAHHH! CAN’T WAIT FOR THE NEXT CHAPTER!

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