Netherlands opens second leg of the European League with win over Greece – Volleyball news
Under the leadership of head coach Gido Vermeulen, the women’s national volleyball team of the Netherlands, defeated Greece in consecutive sets on Friday.
The Dutch ladies followed the winning plan of their coach and cruised past to 3-0 (25-18, 25-21, 25-16) victory in match, which took place at Topsport Centre in Almere. Netherlands now stands with 3-1 record and holds second position in Pool C.
The hosts opened the match with impressive hits from the duo Lonneke Slöetjes and Robin de Kruijf but the opposite side did not take any pressure. Visiting Greeks played a normal game and tacked the difficult shots with great skill. In this regards, the
defensive expert of Greece did a great job and saved many crucial points.
Meanwhile, Netherlands’ Slöetjes showed quality in serves. She made good use of her hands and varied the length of serves. Her short-length serves created a real trouble for Greek players. However, the Greeks gave a good competition and score soared with
close gap. The visiting team went up at the first technical timeout with slight margin of one point (8-7).
Netherlands played fast after the FTT and attacked via Caroline Wensink, who enabled the home team to take lead. Fierce attacks from Wensink and solid serves from Slöetjes put Netherlands on the road to victory. Dutch team grabbed four-point lead at the
next technical break and put pressure on the rival side. The Greeks seemed to have lost momentum and fell down. The opening set came to end at 25-18, while Dutch team improved to 1-0.
The second set was a heated competition from the very start. Greek players made frequent attack attempts and tried to break through the Dutch defence. As a result, the first tie of the scores in the second set was created at 6-all. Evgenia Tsima of Greece
displayed good action on the net and put her team in lead at the FTT (8-7). It was the similar scenario as it was seen in the previous set.
As the action resumed after the break, the Dutch captain Debby Stam-Pilon came strong on opponents. She hit exquisite shots and brought the game to an even point at 12-all, which forced the opposite team to quickly ask for a timeout. The Greeks discussed
the prospects of the game during the timeout and came back with a lot of plans. Nevertheless, the charged-up Dutch ladies continued at same pace. They led the scores 16-13 at the second timeout and kept the lead in hand up till the set points, 25-21.
Despite putting a lot of effort, Greek squad failed to clinch success. It put a psychological pressure on the team whereas the home ladies stayed on top of the game. Greeks ended up with the final score of 16 in third set and accepted defeat in the match.
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