Russia demolishes Sloviakia and gets into the quarterfinal

First play off match between Slovakia and Russia was a bit disappointing one with supremacy of Russian team. Andrey Voronkov team won easily 3-0 (25-20, 25-14, 25-21) get into the quarterfinal where they will face France.

First play off match between Slovakia and Russia was a bit disappointing one with supremacy of Russian team. Andrey Voronkov team won easily 3-0 (25-20, 25-14, 25-21) get into the quarterfinal where they will face France.

It was Slovakia who started better the first set of play offs clash. Despite slow beginning, Olympic champions run up the score to 7-7. But something started to go wrong in Slovakia and Russia was better on second TTO 16-14. However, it was still neck-to-neck game with some good spikes on both sides and aces of Evgeny Sivozhelez and Dmitry Musersky. With powerful attack of Sivozhelez, Russia lead 22-19 and finished with 25-20 score.

The weakest point of both teams was definitely block. Russian reception was far much better than Slovakia so they easily could spike on any way they wanted to. Coach Stefan Chrtiansky tried to change some players, but it did not change situation on the court. Being still good on the serve, Russia demolished Slovakia 25-14.

In last part, Russia continued their successive game and great performance of Musersky, Nikolay Apalikov and Alexey Spiridonov. Being absolutely better in each element, Russia won 25-21 with the best Sergey Pavlov scored 17 and the best on Slovakia’s side Milan Bencz with 10 points only.

Michal Masny: Sadly, we just finished our act in EuroVolley. Our opponent was very strong and it came out they are definitely favorite of that tournament. Today they served well, made possible to score effectively too. Russia was a better team today, so I’d like to congratulate and wish them good luck.

Stefan Chrtiansky:  This afternoon we ensured how great opponent is Russia, especially when they played so strong with serve. My team did their best and more than 100 percent of each playe, but it was not enough. Today we had no chance to win, facing with Russia playing on this level. The only one chance could come to us if Russia wouldn’t play as well on serve, but they didn’t. Today they showed their strength and I am absolutely sure they will go into the finals and maybe will also be the champions. I’d like to congratulate Russia, but also say thanks to my players, because we came here with some of them, who did not play in such an important tournament before. Finally, day after day they improved and I’m happy with it.

Sergey Makarov:  We are obviously happy to end this match with three sets, as we saved some of our strengths. Today we served better, spiked better and were finally strongest team thank Slovakia. We wish them good luck in the future and started to prepare to tomorrow’s match.

Andrey Voronkov: jestem zadowolony z gry druzyny. Naszym zadaniem było maksymalnie skonc się do gry i zaoszczędzić jak najwięcej energii. Wynik jest dobry, ale moglby być lepszy w niektórych elementach i to należy poprawic. Słowacy grali epwnie w grupie,w  ktorej dochodzilo do kalkulacji, ale dzis to my byliśmy lepsi.
I am happy with performance of my team. Our main goal was to totalny focuse on the game and save our energy for tomorrow. Score is fine, but it could be better in some elements. We must to improve those things. Slovakia player well in their group, but today we were better.