Vienna, Austria, September 10, 2011. After a splendid opening ceremony attended also by Austria’s Chancellor Werner Faymann, the home guys got finally the chance to play in front of an almost full house with 6’000 spectators who found their way to the “Wiener Stadthalle”.
After the 0:3 defeat to neighboring Slovenia, head coach Michael Warm stated: “We knew we are not as good as our opponents but I am very proud of my players because they played with glowing hearts and they confirmed that they have been really improving the quality of their play after the hard work of the past months and weeks”.

Austria started by lining-up Ichovski, Binder, Schneider, Gavan, Guttmann and libero Fred Laure. The home side quickly showed some problems in defense as Slovenia – bronze medalist from this year’s European League – took control of the game. As his guys were trailing down 5:11, head coach Michael Warm opted for Simon Claudio Frühbauer to replace Marcus Guttmann; however, it was too late to change the course of the game and Slovenia wrapped the opening set with a pretty speedy 25-20.

Slovenia opened immediately the gap in set 2 by going up 8:3 at the first technical time-out. Thomas Zass got his side back on track with five (!) consecutive aces and Austria moved up 11:9 for the joy of the home fans. The tension was finally gone but Slovenia’s head coach Vukovic was able to get together his players and instruct them properly so Urnaut & Co. got back control of the operations for the final 25-21.

Set 3 was extremely tight but Slovenia could not be stopped on the way to the final 3:0.

“We had a difficult start as the guys were evidently nervous” says Austria’s coach Michael Warm. “However, starting from mid of set 1 we displayed some good actions and honestly to beat a team like Slovenia you need to go beyond your full potential”.

“I have to congratulate my Austrian colleague as he has been building up a good team. I am happy with the result as this is the first win for our country at the final round of the European Champs. My players were able to control their nerves in all critical situations, also in set 2 where Zass served 5 aces. We will have less pressure tomorrow with Serbia as they are the clear-cut favorites of this group. This is a good way to start our campaign as we want to advance to the next round” added Veselin Vukovic.