Co-adaptation of ball reception to the serve constrains outcomes in elite competitive volleyball

How impactful is volleyball’s ‘serve-reception game’? Its efficacy has been found to discriminate between winning and losing a match. But how does reception become (in)effective? Based on the theoretical rationale of ecological dynamics, we e hypothesized that skilled receivers in volleyball would not display ready-made responses, but rather would co-adapt action modes during serve-reception to deal with the specific, emergent constraints of service to achieve ttask goals. In order to examine this issue we investigated whether the co-adaptation of serve and reception action modes was a significant predictor of set outcome in elite volleyball performance (win or loss), analysing the first and last sets of the 2014 World League Finals matches (897 game-sequences). The power-jump and jump-float were the serving modes observed and the overhand, underhand-lateral and underhand-frontal passes were the reception modes categorized. We found that the co- adaptation of serve and reception action modes predicted set outcome in the final set of a match. Receiving the jump-float serve with an overhand pass or underhand-lateral pass increased the odds of winning the final set by 200 per cent. Results suggested that, at an expert level, mastering the overhand pass and the underhand lateral pass gives teams a competitive edge. Receivers showing flexibility in action mode selection improved a team’s odds of successfully winning the final set of a match.