Luxembourg, October 22, 2017. Three matches to end a great weekend of Champions League Volleyball, and the first to secure their place in the 3rd Round were the Slovenian team of ACH Volley LJUBLJANA who repeated their straight sets triumph again over OK Mladost BRCKO. In the other early match it was Shakhtior SOLIGORSK (pictured) who ran out winners in straight sets and so progressed despite losing the first match 2-3 on Wednesday. In the final match of the day Omonia NICOSIA got the two sets they needed to secure their place, despite having a brief scare losing the 2nd set to 14 points. Here are the full results:
ACH Volley LJUBLJANA (SLO) vs. OK Mladost BRCKO (BIH) 3-0 (25-21, 25-19, 25-15)
The orange dragons of Ljubljana have earned themselves a plane ticket to Novosibirsk in Russia after beating OK Mladost BRCKO in front of their own fans in the 2nd round of the Champions League.
Despite what appears to be a comfortable score-line, OK Mladost BRCKO went into the first technical time out with an advantage of three points (8-5). From here ACH Volley LJUBLJANA started to fight harder and tied the score at 13-all with efficient attacking from Matej Mihajlovic. They managed to get into a three-point lead (19-16) and held it with amazing blocking by Jan Pokersnik and Matic Videcnik to finish with the score of 25-21.
The 2nd set was very intense since both teams were exchanging the lead. ACH Volley had an edge with very nice variation in their attack and reached the second technical time out leading 16-9. It proved too much and the home team won it with 25-19. After their win earlier in the week these two sets were all they needed to confirm their place in the 3rd Round.
In the third and final set the head coach of ACH Volley Zoran Kedačič made some changes on the court but in the end they had no trouble taking the final set by 10 points. Jan Pokersnik from the Slovenian team was top scorer with 12 points in the match.
This one is worth watching - check out this amazing (and very casual) piece of defensive action from the home team:
Diko Puric, middle blocker of ACH Volley LJUBLJANA: ''Despite our victory today, I think we can play much better. We are glad we won and play with Lokomotiv NOVOSIBIRSK next, but there it will be much more challenging. We have to start better at the beginning of the set otherwise teams like them will punish us.''
Branko Mišić, assistant coach of OK Mladost BRCKO: ''ACH Volley were too good for us. This is a quality team with a tradition in the Champions League, while this was the first experience for us in this competition. I would like to congratulate them and wish them all the best in the rest of the season."
The matchup in Ljubljana was somehow special for Italian referee Giorgio Gnani. Gnani bid farewell to international Volleyball following the game contested in the Slovenian capital – and the organisers paid tribute to him by presenting Gnani with a ball signed by all members of ACH Volley and OK Mladost. On top of this, the players of both teams stood on the 3-m line and deserved a round of applause to the obviously emotional 52-year-old Italian referee.
Shakhtior SOLIGORSK (BLR) vs. Maccabi TEL-AVIV (ISR) 3-0 (25-23, 31-29, 26-24)
After a five-set thriller in the first leg, everyone’s eyes were on Minsk where two exciting teams came face to face again. After a tense first set it was the home team that pushed through to take the early lead after being up for the majority of the set. Knowing that a 0-3 or 1-3 defeat would see them leave competition, the traveling team from Israel were up against it and despite trailing for large spells in the second set came back when it mattered. As the match went into overtime, the away side thought they had the match levelled, but before they knew it the home side took the spoils again (31-29).
Having lost the first two sets by 2 points, it really was last chance saloon for Maccabi who went behind again and were down as much as 22-19 before coming back to 24-all. However, as with the first two sets they lost out by just two points in the third set and with it lost the match along with their chance at a place in the 3rd Round.
The winning point (shown above) was scored for the Belarusian team by number 4 Andrei Radziuk with a great cross court spike, while top scorer was Uladzimir Zhyhmont with 23 points. Shakhtior SOLIGORSK played well throughout working as a team and they will need that spirit again as they now face Sir Colussi Sicoma PERUGIA from Italy, last year’s Final Four hosts and silver medallists in the next round.
The coach of Shakhtior SOLIGORSK, Viktar Beksha said: "After the defeat in Tel Aviv, we took our lessons from that match. First of all, we intensified our attack. Our opposite played great. This is one of the best matches for Uladzimir Zhyhmont. In the second match we had much fewer mistakes and studied the opponent well."
Jedinstvo Bemax BIJELO POLJE (MNE) vs. Omonia NICOSIA (CYP) 2-3 (24-26, 25-14, 18-25, 28-26, 9-15)
In a game where Omonia NICOSIA needed two sets to progress, that was what they got. They took the first by just a couple of points, but that did not deter the home team who bounced back to take the 2nd set by 11 points. However, knowing they were just one set from a match against JASTRZEBSKI Wegiel, the Cypriot team came out confidently in the 3rd set and got what they came for 25 points to 18. After this, the level of both teams dropped and after an up and down set the home team took the match into a 5th set which they failed to take - meaning the travelling team came away with another victory.
Quotes to follow...
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