Minsk, Belarus, March 25, 2015. The first 2015 CEV Volleyball Challenge Cup - Women semifinal match played on neutral ground in Minsk brought the Russian ladies of Uralochka-NTMK EKATERINBURG a confident 3:0 (25-21, 25-22, 26-24) victory over Ukraine’s Khimik YUZHNY. In 1 hour and 17 minutes Uralochka made a solid first step towards the finals.
From the very beginning of the first set Uralochka took a 2-3-point lead and held on to it tightly up to the set ending where Khimik put up some good fight and evened out the score at 18-18. Uralochka’s traditional strong side of first tempo attack by Sinead Jack and Irina Zaryazhko scored hefty portion of effective execution and restored the lead moving the Russian team up to a solid set ending at 25-21. The second set followed a very similar plot (8-5, 16-12, 25-22) with Khimik moving up closely to Uralachka at the score of 21-20, but the home did not let the opponent take the initiative and quickly reinstalled the gap. Uralochka held its front-running position throughout the third set but at the match points after 24-21, Khimik closed up the gap drawing level at 24-24. At this time the Russian ladies were determined to get this match over with and took the next two points for 26-24.
Uralochka’s middle blockers Sinead Jack and Irina Zaryazhko with excellent efficiency and 18 and 14 points, respectively, were the best scorers of the home team, while Mina Tomic and Anastasia Chernukha scored 14 and 12 points, respectively, for Khimik.
Nikolay Karpol, head coach of Uralochka-NTMK: “I would like to stress that both teams, Uralochka and Khimik, play non-standard volleyball. Khimik is very diverse in its tactics and Uralochka has quite a distinguished game style.”
Sergey Golotov, head coach of Khimik: “Unfortunately, my players did not stick to the plan that we had defined for the match. It is a great honour to play against such a legendary team as Uralochka. And we know that our opponent is playing us after tough Russian league playoff matches. We have one more game and we are not giving up…”
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