Better attack leads Serbia to 3-1 victory against Korea – Volleyball news
Serbian women’s national volleyball team posted 3-1 (16-25, 25-21, 25-13, 25-20) win over Korea in the Olympic qualifying match on Tuesday.
Strong offence was the main key for Serbia’s success in the match. More than 1,000 spectators came to watch the thrilling encounter of European champion Serbia with Korean team at the Tokyo Metropolitan Gym. Korea put up a nice show in the opening stanza
but lost the momentum in the following sets. Victory moved Serbia in the third spot on ranking chart, while Korea held the fourth position.
The opposite hitter Jovana Brakocevic amazed the audience with her quality attacks. She totalled team-high 22 points and surely played a big role in her team’s success. Stefana Veljkovic and Jovana Vesovic followed her up with 13 points each.
On Korean side, superstar Kim Yeon-Koung put up valiant effort and contributed match-high 30 points. It was indeed a brilliant act of Kim but her team could not benefit from her feat.
The early picture of the game was quite different from the outcome as Korea started off on strong footing and secured the first set. Korea served with accuracy and showed great consistency in attack, which led the team to 6-point lead at the first technical
timeout. Serb ladies, on the other hand, took time to grasp the game plan of opponents but Korea hit the mark with 25-16 win.
The following set started out on a different note as Serbia led the scores and pushed Korea behind. Strong offence and solid defence of Serbian team proved to be big hurdle for Korea in the second set. However, Korean players fought bravely and used many
different tactics to break the rhythm of pumped-up Serbs. Nothing could work in Korea’s favour and Serbia captured the second set, 25-21.
Korea fell down and failed to return in the game. Meanwhile, Serbia continued with success and improved to 2-1 by winning third set with big margin (25-13). Finally, Serbia put an end to the affair by posting 25-20 in fourth set. Serbia made a great comeback
in the game and settled for 3-1 victory.
Speaking of the match, Serbian Head Coach Zoran Terzic said, “It was a good game today. We won finally. We played bad at the start but got it together from the second set. We hope we can play that way the rest of the tournament. Jovana Vesovic is a good
player. She has been dealing with a shoulder injury but played well today. We must use all of our players. In this moment, this is the best team of Serbia.”
Serbian middle-blocker Stefana Veljkovic agreed with the coach that they started out poorly but gradually worked up their position in the match. She added, “We won an important game. We would like to play this way for the rest of the tournament.”
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