03/12/2015 22:41
Swiss Dragons celebrate first win, ease past Romanian champions Tomis
2016 CEV DenizBank Volleyball Champions League - Men
Lugano, Switzerland, December 3, 2015. On Thursday night Swiss champions #Dragons LUGANO could celebrate their first victory in Pool G of the 2016 CEV DenizBank Volleyball Champions League – Men. The Swiss team cruised to a 3:0 win (26-24, 25-23, 25-22) in their matchup with Romania’s champions Tomis CONSTANTA to get back in contention for a spot in the Playoffs. With this result LUGANO now have four points, the same tally as Belgium’s Volley ASSE-LENNIK, who earlier this week lost to Poland’s giants Asseco Resovia RZESZOW, the undisputed leaders in the Pool with nine full points and three wins from as many matches.
Though the match ended in three sets, the game was a close fight from start to end since both teams desperately wanted to record a victory to keep alive their dreams of moving on to the Playoffs. In the end the Swiss Dragons reached this goal they shared with Romania’s champions and did so with a great team performance. The best scorers for #Dragons LUGANO in the end were outside spiker Matti Hietanen (12 points, including one ace and three blocks) and Leo Andric who totalled 15 points. Metodi Ananiev and Dragos Pavel recorded 17 points apiece for the Romanian team, yet not enough to win even one set.
All the sets were very close and only towards the end, and this applies especially to the first and the second ones, the home team had the strength to finish it off. A great performance by Andrei Radziuk and Hietanen contributed to the final 26-24 in the first set while Teodor Todorov and Leo Andric – with three straight points – chiefly helped the home team seal the final 25-23 in the second period. The third set was finished at 25-22 and this time around Radziuk and Hietanen were again the real match winners for the Swiss Dragons.
The head coach of #Dragons LUGANO Mario Motta commented: “We are very happy for this success, we got to feel some pressure going into the match but we also played with a great desire to win. All players performed really well tonight and this victory is very important for the standing of our pool.”
The mentor of Tomis CONSTANTA, Martin Stoev, said: “Our situation is very difficult, with some players struggling with physical problems. We fought from start to end but LUGANO did better than us towards the end of each set.”
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