Kazakhstan tops standings in Pool G of 2011 Asian Men’s Volleyball Championship
With two straight-set wins against Afghanistan and Chinese Taipei, the Kazakhstan men’s national volleyball team topped the standings in Pool G of 2011 Asian Men’s Volleyball Championship. In the first match on Sunday, Kazakhstan over came the Afghanistan team and carried the same momentum into the next match on Monday as the Kazak squad worked out a great win over the Chinese Taipei team. Kazakhstan bagged six points at the end of the second round and settled for the top slot. Kazaks are now scheduled to go up against Qatar in the semi-final for the 9th-12th positions on Wednesday.
Match 1: Kazakhstan 3, Afghanistan 0
Azadi Hall 2 in Tehran, Iran hosted the match between Kazakhstan and Afghanistan the where former proved to be the better team and stole the show by posting (25-14, 25-13, 25-9). Most essentially it was a one-sided affair as Kazakhstan was far better than the underdog Afghanistan.
Kazaks made the best start and delivered unstoppable serves and spikes. Alexander Stolnikov showed the power of his forearms and flabbergasted his opponents in the early few minutes of the game. Afghani players offered the best they could but failed to save the set as they lost with a margin of 11 points.
In the second set Kazakhstan was better in the attack and defence as they scored consecutive points, while Afghanistan also scored on some attack errors from Kazakhstan. On the whole, the situation remained unchanged and Kazakhstan comfortably extended its lead to 2-0 by capturing second set.
The immense pressure from opposite side further spoiled the match for Afghanistan. They failed to sustain the pressure and totally collapsed. Kazaks restricted them to a low score of 9 in the third set and announced match victory in straight sets.
Match 2: Kazakhstan 3, Chinese Taipei 0
In the second match on Monday, September 26, Kazakhstan was challenged by Chinese Taipei (C.T.). The match lasted for 67 minutes and spanned only three sets. Kazakhstan maintained the perfect flow of scores against C.T. and recorded a 3-0 win by sending 25-17, 25-15, 25-22 to the board.
Chinese Taipei was comparatively better than Afghanistan and they gave a good competition to Kazakhstan. However, the Kazak ‘army’ displayed good action on the net and did not allow C.T. to come back on top. Kazakhstan’s scoring machine, Dmitriy Gorbatkov, contributed a match-high 14 points and created trouble for the C.T. defence. Moreover, Vitaliy Erdshtein, followed him with 11 points and played an important role in Kazakhstan’s win.
On the other hand, none of the Chinese Taipei players could go into double-digit scores. Wang Ming-Chun and Huang Shih-Hao were the top-performers and added 7 and 6 points, respectively.
Kazakhstan maintained its winning streak of two matches and finished in the top position in Pool G.
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