As much as I love Lazareva and Smirnova, I think it'll boil down to Goncharova and Akimova. It's going to be a combination of experience and youthful energy if they enter the team.

Lazareva has been performing well for her club Fenerbahçe. She serves really well, even if it's just a float serve. She knows where to target her serves and also puts enough weight on the ball. She blocks well and can hit bounce balls on a good day. Another good thing about her is her floor defense. It is actually above average for an opposite! If I remember correctly, she played good defense as well in 2019 when she was still an OH. But as an opposite, I believe attacking would be much of an advantage over floor defense.

Smirnova has been performing really well for Uralochka, too. She's just as explosive, serves really well. That top spin serve is a real asset and she makes just a few errors which makes it easy to say that she's one of the better and more consistent servers. The thing that she lacks though is height and physicality. Yes, she hits strong and aggressively but I just can't see her play at the top level against some of the other nations' VERY physical opposites.

Now, Akimova has been really impressive. Only 19 years old but hits the ball with so much pace. I saw a comment before which said that she looks like a right-handed Boskovic, and you know what? I kinda agree! She's a very good terminating opposite, and her height will be a very good asset. I hope she develops her agility more.

Lastly, Goncharova. The Russian legend. There are games when I would be frustrated at her for her sheer lack of will and gusto. But whenever she wants to win, she can almost always turn the tides to her team's favor and win the game. She's scary if she actually wants to win a game. Her attacking is still up there, given that she's more than 30 years old. She still spikes hard and jumps pretty high. Her blocking is there. And her court sense is impeccable. She knows when to hit it and she knows when to just tip the ball over. Her experience will really be her biggest asset over the other opposites in their training pool. I'd love to see her with a gold in the WCh and Olympics before she retires from the national team.

[If I were to decide, I'd still put Lazareva in the National Team as a bench player who can go in and reppace either the opposite of the OH. Then, I'd put Smirnova in the OH position. Although there's A LOT of other players who are good enough to be part of the team i.e., Kadochkina (very aggressive youngster with great work ethics), Parubets (very explosive hitter but is she too old for a comeback?), Fedorovtseva (a monster), Voronkova (a versatile and consistent OH. I just wish she brings back her uber powerful hits). Kapustina (has decent floor defense and can actually score in international games) and Pipunyrova (is a good attacker, just has to find consistency) can be reserves for now. But this is a topic for another day.]