Do not bother getting invested in this series, whatever payoff you're looking for does not exist here. This series get's compared to Haikyuu, and in a formulaic manner they bear similarities. Trade relative heights of the two rivals turned teammates who face off at the beginning of the series, there's a blonde alumni male coach there to help, just drain the importance of every other character on the team away. This series is also admittedly well animated with great dynamic motions that make you feel the whirring speed and cracking pop of the shuttlecocks.
However where Haikyuu universally inspires a love of volleyball in its viewers, this series is more likely to just piss you off constantly, in fact it'll become the main reason you keep watching. This series masquerades a bit under the mask of friendship and good sportsmanship. But will hit you repeatedly with nasty encounters that just make you want to see people lose in ways that will break their spirits rather root for any particular person to win. Seriously, I assure you I'm not exaggerating.
While the series does stick to realistic sports action, I found it lacking for in-depth explanations at times for terms it would throw out, strategic logic, player tactics or specialties, often just vaguely asserting that someone is good or fast. This can vary from slightly noticeable to very jarring depending on how much the series cares about the characters involved. However these are small gripes in the long-run, because quite frankly the sport isn't the most important thing here oddly enough, and it's not the reason to keep watching.
The reason to watch this series, is for the hope of revenge, and that sweet sweet revenge ain't coming.
This section contains spoilers of varying degree.
The main reason to watch this series, and the main reason you will if you do not heed warnings will be your desire to see the main character's mother suffer or at the very least receive her comeuppance. She spent years raising her daughter to feel she only had worth if she could perform up to her national champion mother's standards. Only spending time with her seemingly to play badminton, and cutting their time short literally the moment her daughter lost a point. Then after her first big loss the mother literally abandons her daughter, packs up and leaves the country to raise another kid to play badminton.
Honestly the tournament action grew boring and predictable quickly, it really won't surprise you, the only reason you'll still feel invested will be to see her get revenge on the woman who abandoned her and crushed her spirit. But unfortunately, like many series this one lacks the stomach for proper confrontation or repercussions, so by the end everyone's smiling with literally nothing having changed at all. The mother has this annoying permagrin that she'll get to keep the entire time as she leaves again, feeling in her heart she did the right thing all along and the series acting like "yeah this is fine".
Yes sometimes it's easy to get worked up over a desire for retributions for a character's sake that the series simply won't fulfill, but these are often placed there by us the viewers. When a series spends it's entire season focusing on the main character's reason and plan for revenge against their own parent, you expect some sort of payoff.
But no, at the very end it tries putting the smiling mask of shounen-style friendship back on and expects us to not notice the cheap hunk of plastic and string it's wearing.
Afternote:
The manga seems more like a lighthearted comedic romp that might be more enjoyable, I can't really bring myself to read it though after realizing I'll never get to see Ayano take any action against her mother. This feels like its put scars on my heart in places where I've never been cut, and I fear the only cure will be a better anime to wash out the taste of this one.
