Yang Hao (volleyball player)
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| Medal record | |||
|---|---|---|---|
 Yang Hao |
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| Women's Volleyball | |||
Competitor for  China |
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| Olympic Games | |||
| Gold | 2004 Athens | Team Competition | |
| Asian Games | |||
| Gold | 2006 Doha | Team Competition | |
Yang Hao (Chinese: 杨昊; Pinyin: Yáng Hào; born 21 March 1980) is a Chinese volleyball player.
Contents |
[edit] Career
Yang was born in Liaoning province in China. Her mother was a volleyball player in the 1980s and inspired her to play volleyball at a young age.
Upon the failure of the Chinese Womens Volleyball Team in Syndey Olympics 2000, the new coach Chen Zhonghe reformed the team in 2001 and introduced a lot of new players, Yang being one of them. Since then, Yang has been the main wing spiker for the Chinese Team and competed for the team in almost every match.
Her career path as an international player started off very well, gaining the award of MVP in the World Grand Champion Cup 2001, which was her first large international competition. She was named "Lang Ping the second" by the media. Her performance continued in 2002, when she obtained the award of Best Scorer and Best Server in the World Grand Prix 2002. However, at the World Championship held in November 2002, she had a bad performance in the semi-final match against Italy, causing the China Team to lose. At the year end of 2002 when she returned to the Liaoning team to compete in the China League, she was being heavily criticized by the province coach for her bad performance.
Despite all the doubts about her from the media and the province coach, with the support and trust of coach Chen Zhonghe, Yang quickly recovered from the trough, and assisted her team in obtaining the first world championship title after 17 years - World Cup 2003. She was named the MVP in two of the matches.
In 2004, Yang's team-mate middle blocker Zhao Rui Rui, who was the Best Spiker and second Best Blocker in the World Cup, was injured seriously, while preparing for the Olympic Games 2004. With the absence of Zhao Rui Rui and the different levels of illness and injuries of the team members, the performance of the China team was affected seriously, getting only 5th in the World Grand Prix 2004, which was held one month before the Olympic Games 2004.
In the Olympic Games 2004, the team performed very well under pressure. They defeated Russia in the finals by 3:2 after losing the first 2 sets, and obtained the gold medal. Yang had a very consistent performance, she was ranked top 10 for Best Scorer, Best Server and Best Spiker, and was the only player in the China Team that had not been substituted for once in the court.
Since 2005, coach Chen Zhonghe recruited a lot of new players to the team, but Yang remains as the main player in the team.
[edit] Characteristics
Yang is only 1.83m tall, which is relatively short compared to other volleyball players. Unlike some volleyball players like Russian player Gamova (2.06m) whose strength is height and power, Yang's strength is speed and skills. Her spikes are very fast and can escape from the blocks of the opponent, she can utilize volleyball skills like touch out very well. Her back spike successful rate is also very high.
Another strength of Yang is her ability to serve. She ranked top 5 in Best Server in basically every international competition that she participated. Yang also has the ability to receive and dig, and therefore she does not require a Libero to substitute her when she is in the back row of the court.
Before 2005, despite possessing certain degree of receiving and digging abilities, Yang was mainly used as the "Scoring Machine" in the team. She was always the top 2 scorer in the team, along with Zhao Rui Rui. Since 2005, Chen Zhonghe introduces various new players who are tall but lack the ability to receive and dig, like Xue Ming, Wang Yi Mei etc. Yang has to adapt to the new role of being a key player in reception and digging, and yet still maintains to be the main scorer in the team.
In the court, Yang likes to put a smile in her face. She describes herself as very optimistic. Despite occasional criticism of being "not serious during competition", Yang has maintained this manner.
Yang seldom talks about her personal life but confessed that she had a boyfriend in 2003. He is a businessman in Beijing.
[edit] Major titles
- World Grand Champion Cup 2001 (World title)
- Seoul Asian Games 2002
- Montrux Volley Masters 2003
- World Grand Prix 2003 (World title)
- World Cup 2003 (World Champion)
- Athens Olympic Games 2004 (World Champion)
- Doha Asian Games 2006
- Montreux Volley Masters 2007
[edit] Individual Awards
- Most Valuable Player (World Grand Champion Cup 2001)
- Best Scorer (World Grand Prix 2003)
- Best Server (World Grand Prix 2002, 2003, 2005, 2007)
- Best Spiker (Montreux Volley Masters 2005)
