Ok, maybe I'm stupid, but... I need some help

I rented the game from BB, and of course, it has no directions included.

I figured out there's "hard" and "soft" receiving and attacking, but...

Why does my character sometimes run and spike the ball with no command from me? Also, everytime that happens, it always gets blocked. I've tried pushing the analog stick to make her spike it at an angle, but it doesn't seem to do anything.

What's the difference in a hard/soft receive and attack? Are there any combo type moves for special serves, spikes, dives, etc?

So far I've been losing all my matches rather badly

When you soft pass, your partner will pass it back to you if it's not the third touch. When you hard pass, your partner is more likely to take a shot.

Hard attack is a spike, while a soft attack is a feint. Feints go over an attempted block.

Holding left or right on the d-pad gives you a different type of serve.

www.gamefaqs.com, far superior to any manual