Italy gets first win in opening round of 2011 FIVB Grand Prix – Volleyball News
The cracking action of women’s volleyball is underway this week as the 2011 FIVB Grand Prix has been officially opened on Friday, August 5. Women’s National teams from sixteen countries of the world were featured in the opening matches of the competition
yesterday. In Pool A, teams from Italy and the Dominican Republic crossed patchs. Team Italy proved to be the better side and emerged as winners of the opening match. They settled for victory over the Dominican Republic with a convincing score of 3-1 (25-18,
22-25, 25-18, and 25-17). The City of Bydgoszcz in Poland set up the field of play for the exciting thriller.
Italian players took full advantage of their better stature and strong physicality in the first set. Serena Ortolani and Valentina Arrighetti formed a combo and worked out great offensive attacks. Lucia Bosetti played her part and did a great job at defence.
Eventually, the combined effort of Italian players led them to success in set one.
Dominican Republic hit back in the following set and attacked with Priscilla Rivera. Moreover, the solid blocking of Milagros restricted Italy from going up on the score-chart. Dominicans’ effort proved to be fruitful and they equalled the game-score by
winning second set.
In 3rd and 4th set, Dominican Republic started out well but gradually Italy clawed its way to success in both sets. Italian Captain Martina Guiggi kept her team focused on the target and Italy accomplished great success. Success in
only one set of the match couldn’t help Dominicans to celebrate victory. On contrary, Italy captured three set and bagged first win of the 2011 FIVB Grand Prix.
The Skipper of Dominican Republic, Milagros Cabral de la Cruz said that the real trouble for Dominican Republic was the powerful serves of opponents. Moreover the Dominican Republic’s attack was not very strong, which couldn’t make a great impression on
the Italians. Keeping all these in mind, she said that Italy more deserved to win the match.
Italy captain, Martina Guiggi: "We are happy that we won the first official game of this season. Dominican Republic played very good, especially in attack and defense. We had to be patient, because ball didn’t want to fall down even after our strong spikes.
We had to put much more force in our attacks to score.”
Italian Coach Massimo Barbolini praised the good combination of attack and defence of his team. He congratulated the players for taking the right start in the campaign.
Marcos Kwiek of Dominican Republic stated: “Congratulation to Italian team. We have to forget this defeat and think about tomorrow’s game. I’m sure, that we can improve during this tournament. One of our strongest points is physical preparation, so we work
hard during trainings and the team will recover easily to face Poland on Saturday.”
Coming up next
In the second of the preliminary round of the 2011 FIVB Grand Prix on Saturday, Italy is scheduled to meet Argentina. The opponents do not post a great threat to the Italians as Argentina already lost the first match to Poland. The Italian squad, on the
other hand, is enjoying great form and team will be in better position to put pressure on the Argentineans.
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