04/02/2014 23:13
A historical win for Saint Cloud in a Challenge Cup quarterfinal
2014 CEV Volleyball Challenge Cup - Women
Paris, France, February 4, 2014. For the first time in its history, the French club of SF PARIS Saint Cloud is playing in the European Cups. Making it to the quarterfinals of the 2014 CEV Volleyball Challenge Cup - Women was nice, but winning a victory in the quarterfinals was even better. In its first-leg encounter with Poland’s Impel WROCLAW at home, Saint Cloud won by 3:2 (32-30, 18-25, 25-22, 22-25, 15-12).
The beginning of the match was clamped between the two teams with a slight advantage for Saint Cloud after some good serving from Bojana Markovic. The hard work in defense by French libero Lisa Menet-Haure allowed the home team to keep the lead. Impel managed to come back and prompted coach Rayna Minkova to take her two time-outs in the money time. Finally, the set concluded with a successful block for the French side for a dramatic 32-30, shaped up after 37 minutes of play.
Impel made a strong start of the second set taking an early 8-3 lead. Despite great efforts, the players of Saint Cloud failed to catch up and Impel won the set by 25-18.
The third set is better for both teams. Grace Carter’s impeccable blocking and attacking helped her team take the lead! The rallies were long and hotly contested. Well encouraged by the Parisian spectators the home heroines took the advantage by winning the set by 25-22.
Both teams put up a great fight in the fourth set and the score was very close. Frauke Dirickx set some good balls for the Polish spikers, but Saint Cloud had not said its last word. With some strong serving and blocking, the French team stayed in touch, but eventually lost by 22-25.
In the tie-break, Impel took an 8-6 lead, to be followed by a tight contest. Bogumila Pyziolek’s strong spikes gave the Parisian defense a lot of hard time. However, Saint Cloud’s players managed to pull together all their remaining strength to fight back and successfully overcome the opponent by 15-12 to celebrate victorious.
Scoring 21 points for the winning team, Sona Mikyskova was the most prolific player of the match, followed by Grace Carter with 19. Impel’s best scorer was Maren Brinker who tallied up 18 points.
Click here for more info including detailed stats of the match.
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