03/08/2019 23:45
Three Polish teams chase home gold in Malbork
2019 World Tour 1-Star - Malbork
Malbork, Poland, August 3, 2019. As many as three teams from Poland have made it to Sunday’s semi-finals at the FIVB World Tour 1-Star event in Malbork. Together with one team from Lithuania, they will fight for gold on the final day of the tournament.
The programme was a very intensive one on Saturday, with the Round of 12 and quarterfinal matches. There was a full stadium a number of times throughout the day to witness the actions of the home teams as well as of all others fighting for a spot in the semis.
In the first quarterfinal, Mariusz Prudel and Mikolaj Miszczuk played against Lithuania’s Artur Vasiljev and Robert Juchnevic. After the home favourites started the game in style, the Lithuanians came back. Some huge blocks of Prudel and amazing saves from Miszczuk propelled the Polish team to a five-point advantage in the tiebreaker – and they did not relinquish it until the very end.
The winners of Pool C, Lithuania’s Patrikas Stankevicius and Audrius Knasas played a Baltic derby with Latvia’s Toms Smedins and Haralds Regza. Smedins and Regza had previously edged Pavel Piatrushka and Aliaksandr Dziadkou of Belarus in the Round of 12, however this time the Latvians could not display their best game and lost 0-2 to their much younger colleagues from Lithuania.
There was again a full stadium for the remaining quarterfinals – as these involved Polish teams. Martin Chiniewicz/Michal Korycki and Michal Kądzioła/Marcin Ociepski delighted the crowd and with the support of the local fans, the home favourites beat opponents from Italy and Czech Republic, respectively. Italy’s Manuel Alfieri and Mauro Sacripanti could be still happy with their result in Malbork as they had reached the quarterfinals from the qualification round and they are both only 21 years old.
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