Zlín, Czech Republic, April 8, 2018. After an unsuccessful start to the 2018 CEV U18 Volleyball European Championship - Men, Greece and Bulgaria managed to record their first wins over Turkey (3-1) and hosts Czech Republic (3-2), respectively. Germany becomes the pool leader with two wins in as many matches following their 3-1 dispatch of Belarus.
Live streaming of all matches is available here.
Greece vs. Turkey 3-1 (19-25, 25-22, 26-24, 25-17)
Although Turkey was in the lead for the whole duration of the first set, you could really feel in the monster blocks and some incredible kills that the Greeks had what it took to break the game in their favour. And that is exactly what they did in the later sets, in fact Greece claimed the third set rather miraculously after being behind Turkey, but still managing to get to 24-24 and taking the set home two points later. After this, the fourth set was completely dominated by the Greeks and they were able to claim their first victory of the final round of this championship.
Stefanos Nanas, head coach of Greece recalled the match against the Czechs: "I told the guys yesterday, that the game we played was not Greece. That was another team. We relaxed last night and we discussed all our problems and set a goal that the match today would be much better. It is a big satisfaction to beat Turkey, because twice we lost 2-3 against them in the past. It is a big day for us, we must rest now for the game tomorrow with Bulgaria. The tournament has just started for us."
His colleague Hüseyin Düzceler from Turkey was sad to see the final result on the table: "We showed our worst game throughout the whole match and that is the reason, why we lost. We won yesterday and we hoped that we were going to play very well today, but we are very sad about how the game went."
Czech Republic vs. Bulgaria 2-3 (19-25, 25-21, 18-25, 25-18, 9-15)
After losing the first set the home walls and fans that have gathered here in Zlin helped the Czechs recover, but the confident youngsters that won their opening game against Greece were nowhere to be found. Bulgaria used this to their advantage, especially in the last set, where they left no options for their opponents, as the Balkan team grew their lead point by point.
Plamen Hristov, head coach of the winning team confirmed they had reached their goal: "The most important thing was the victory today and we wanted to achieve it no matter what. Our players did not play as good as they could. This pool will be the pool of unexpected results and I hope the best for us is yet to come."
Czech coach Jiří Zach was able to recap the game perfectly: "Bulgaria played in a different way than they played yesterday against Germany. They did not make mistakes and played with good strength. We adapted to their style of play in the end. It seemed that when one of the teams reached 12 points, this team won the set. We were not able to serve hard in the whole match, we had no aces. The Bulgarians made their side-out easy and we did not. The fifth set was decided immediately at the beginning with our two reception mistakes. Bulgaria served really hard today and created big pressure on our reception and we did not handle this pressure in the tie-break."
Germany vs. Belarus 3-1 (25-19, 29-31, 25-19, 25-19)
The final match of the day in Zlín proved to be an exciting one as both teams showed they wanted to be victorious. Germany claimed an easy win in the first set, the second came with some old-school volleyball showed by Belarus as they jumped high, hit hard, and held the lead for most of the set, but managed to seal the deal only after five set points at 31-29. After this, Germany continued their road to victory, won the remaining two sets, and took the lead of Pool I as the only team, who has won both of their games this far.
Matus Kalny, head coach of Germany, was proud of his whole team: "Today we saw, how important the bench is, because three players, which came into our game later on, brought another spirit. Again, we played quite well in defense, it was not such a good day for our attack, but the three substitutes really helped the team and we won."
Coach Aliaksei Kavaliou of the opposite team admitted: "Good match, good players. It was a hard game for the German team and also for us. We made a lot of mistakes and that is why we lost the match today."
The games will continue with the pool play tomorrow and eventually reach the climax on April 15, when the champions will be crowned.
Tickets to attend the matches of #EuroVolleyU18M in Zlin are available on Ticketportal. The price for a daily ticket in the pool stage stands at 50 CZK, while tickets for the semi-finals and medal matches cost 100 CZK (approximately € 2 and 4, respectively). The price for a ticket valid for the whole tournament is 300 CZK (about € 12). Children and teenagers until 16 years of age enjoy free entrance to the tournament. Tickets are available for purchase here.
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