Istanbul, Turkey, March 11, 2015.  Dinamo MOSCOW qualified for the semifinals of the 2015 CEV Volleyball Cup – Men despite losing the return quarterfinal match against Fenerbahce SK. in Istanbul.  The Russian team lost by 2:3 (22-25, 29-27, 26-28, 25-19, 14-16), but the two sets won were exactly what it needed to eliminate its powerful Turkish opponent.  In its battle to move on to the final, Dinamo will face Belgium’s Volley behappy2 ASSE-LENNIK.

Fenerbahce started the game very effectively and led by 8-5 at the first technical time-out.  Especially Ivan Miljkovic showed great performance and Fenerbahce went up to 16-9 at the.  Dinamo started to narrow the gap, but could not catch up the opponent and lost by 22-25.  The story started to repeat as the home side went up to 8-5 and 16-12 at the two technical breaks of the second set, but after that they made several mistakes, allowing Dinamo to draw level at 23-23.  After that the visiting team looked more powerful than Fenerbahce and took the second set by 29-27.  The third set was even more competitive, while both teams committed some serving mistakes.  Once again, Dinamo caught up after trailing slightly in the score, but this time the Turkish team showed a great performance in the extra time to win by 28-26.  The Russians made a superb start of the fourth set leading up to 8-3 and 16-11 leads at the two technical time-outs.  Dinamo‘s super star Ivan Zaytsev showed his qualities and helped his squad close the set at 25-19 and secure its spot in the semis. Hence, both teams started the fifth set with young players, who made several mistakes, especially in serving.  Fenerbahce’s youngsters showed great energy and took the fifth set by 16-14 to win the game.

Ivan Miljkovic was the top scorer of the match with 22 points for Fenerbahce, while Denis Biryukov scored 20 for the visiting team.

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