07/02/2020 14:25
Mladost come from behind to secure ‘historic’ success for Croatian Volleyball
CEV Volleyball Cup 2020 - Women
Zagreb, Croatia, February 7, 2020. Mladost ZAGREB became earlier this week the first Croatian team in 20 years to reach the quarterfinals of a European competition. They achieved this feat after a truly dramatic 8th Final match with Hungary’s Fatum NYIREGYHAZA in the CEV Volleyball Cup 2020 – Women.
There was a blackout affecting the entire district of Zagreb when Mladost were leading 19-17 in the second set and the match officials had to stop the game for almost an hour. With Mladost leading 2-1 after the match resumed, and 23-21 in the fourth set, the visitors from Hungary scored four times in a row to extend the match to a fifth set. Mladost claimed the tiebreaker to call for a Golden Set to determine the eventual winners of this fixture. The team from Hungary stormed to a 14-10 lead there, but with Valentina Vrbanc standing behind the service line, Mladost fought their way back to triumph 19-17.
Saša Ivanišević, head coach of Mladost ZAGREB: “After such a dramatic game where we went through a lot, I can only be happy and proud of my players. We have accomplished a great success by making it to the quarterfinals of the CEV Cup, especially seeing which teams have remained in the competition. I think we are by far the youngest team exclusively based on own players, which gives us an even bigger boost to continue with our work and project. We are looking forward to our next match with the Polish team Grupa Azoty Chemik POLICE in our home venue Dom odbojke, and I believe we will give the audience a nice show.”
Valentina Vrbanc, player of Mladost ZAGREB: “Where do I start? How does one feel at 10-14 into the Golden Set? It is at moments like these that you feel all of your hard work was for nothing, that you are so close and yet so far away. You are the only hope for a 26-year-old dream to come true. Alone against everyone but, you press on, performing the first serve better than you could ever imagine, after which we felt more at ease, relaxed and that way we could turn this into a victory. Luckily, that is exactly what happened. We delivered an excellent performance in the last few points and this won us something great. It really showed that a major effort, with a bit of luck, pays off in the end.”
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