Belgrade, Serbia, February 4, 2014. NANTES Rezé Métropole gained the 3-point advantage before the home rematch in the 2014 CEV Volleyball Challenge Cup - Men quarterfinals. In the first leg match that took place in the Serbian capital, the French side managed to defeat the home guys of Crvena Zvezda BEOGRAD by 3:1 (25-20, 25-21, 21-25, 26-24).
During the match NANTES had an advantage, but the host team was holding up to the end. The experienced Iban Perez Manzanares and Ales Holubec led the team from France and became the best point contributors to the win with 20 points each. Dusan Petkovic, captain of Crvena Zvezda, became once again the top scorer of the match with 27 points. Captain of NANTES Branislav Skladany did not play because of illness.
After two relatively easy sets for the visiting side, in third and the fourth, the players of Crvena Zvezda showed that they have the strength and quality for more. They won the third period of play by 25-21, but they suffered in the fourth to lose it by a narrow 24-26.
"I am satisfied because we won. We like to win so I expect that we will celebrate in Nantes as well. After two easy sets I did not expect that Zvezda would be back in the game, but they have a very good team. After the third set we had a serious problem,“ said Martin Demar, coach of NANTES.
"We can play with anyone. With our aggression and desire to win, we can win against everybody. We made so many mistakes and that was the reason for our defeat. I am sorry, especially because of the last point. We are not looking for anyone to blame and we will bravely go to Nantes for the rematch,” added Zvezda coach Dusko Nikolic.
Click here for more info including detailed stats of the match.