17/03/2016 23:33
Cucine Lube CIVITANOVA come from behind to set sights on Final Four
2016 CEV DenizBank Volleyball Champions League - Men
Civitanova Marche, Italy, March 17, 2016. On Thursday night Cucine Lube CIVITANOVA recorded a come-from-behind 3-2 victory (21-25, 21-25, 25-17, 25-18, 15-11) in front of 3,620 spectators at Eurosuole Forum to claim the first round of the Playoffs 6 clash with Turkey’s Halkbank ANKARA in the 2016 CEV DenizBank Volleyball Champions League – Men.
The team from Turkey’s capital caught a good start in the first set, as they got up to an early 10-7 lead and could keep it through 13-9 with a massive block of their Bulgarian opposite Tsvetan Sokolov. Cucine Lube CIVITANOVA closed in to 14-13 via the good performance of their charismatic captain Ivan Miljkovic (he scored five points in the opening set, with a 67% success rate in attack), but this was not enough since Halkbank built a good margin with the help of Kevin Le Roux’s serves and solid blocking by Sokolov. The final 25-21 win for Halkbank was sealed by an error of Miljkovic.
In the second set the visitors quickly cruised to a 12-8 lead which was again propelled by great serves of Le Roux and Dragan Travica, while their middle blockers performed well too. Cucine Lube’s mentor Gianlorenzo Blengini replaced outside spikers Osmany Juantorena and Klemen Cebulj with Simone Parodi and Reid Priddy, respectively but this move did not change the course of the game. Halkbank ANKARA dominated the scene with Bulgaria’s national team star Sokolov scoring seven points in this section of the game (25-21).
The trend completely changed in the third set, with Cucine Lube CIVITANOVA opening a margin of five points at the first technical time-out. The Italian team replaced Klemen Cebulj with the experienced American spiker Reid Priddy, and as a result rushed to 15-9 lead first and then extended it to 19-13 by showing a good performance in all aspects of the game. Osmany Juantorena recorded seven points (and a mind-boggling 100% success rate in attack) to become the top scorer for the home team in this set, as CIVITANOVA re-opened the fate of the match following their commanding 25-17 win.
The Italians continued to perform in the same way also in the fourth set, setting the pace of the game with the help of 2008 Olympic champion Reid Priddy who scored eight points in this period and steered the home team together with their Serbian middle blockers Marko Podrascanin and Dragan Stankovic. CIVITANOVA deservedly won the set 25-18 to call for the tie-break.
After a very balanced fifth set, the home team completed their comeback with a 15-11 win thanks to the mini break resulting from a block stamped by Dragan Stankovic (12-10), and the errors made by Halkbank’s spikers Dick Kooy and Michal Kubiak.
Osmany Juantorena was the top scorer of the match with 19 points, while Tsvetan Sokolov paced Halkbank with 18.
“Our opponents played much better than we did in the first and second sets,” said the home side’s head coach Gianlorenzo Blengini. “However, my guys were good at finding the mental strength which was required to not give up and re-open the fate of the match. Now I feel quite confident about the return match, even though we all know that we can expect a real battle to follow in Turkey.”
Click here for more info including detailed stats of the match
Click here for a video interview with the Reid Priddy
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