Recap of Xue/Zhange’s gold medal victory at the 2nd Asian Games Women’s Beach Volleyball Tournament
The top-seeded pairing of China, the amazing Xue Chen and bombastic Zhang Xi never fails to impress. They did it again at the 2nd Asian Games in Thailand!
Xue and Zhang exhibited a great performance at the 2nd Asian Games Women’s Beach Volleyball Tournament, which completed its run on Thursday, 16th December, 2010. They posted 2-0 (21-9, 21-12) victory over Thailand’s Phokongpoly Yupa
and Komoltip Kulna. The famous Al Musannah Sports City in Thailand hosted the wonderful event of Beach Volleyball Tournament.
The 2010 season, brought a lot of luck for the Chinese pair. They performed tremendously throughout the year. Quite recently, they clinched the gold ware at Guangzhou Asian Games. They also grabbed the top honour of Asian Beach Volleyball Championship in
Haikou, China. The gold medal victory at the 2nd Asian Games is another proof of their classical skills in the game of Beach Volleyball. The victorious duo has further set their eyes on the 2011 National Games.
First Set
Xue and Zhang opened the match with their terrific serves and convincing spikes. The tall and physically strong Zhang supplied plenty of power to her shots. She quickly traded places with her teammate and took the score by storm. The wonderful Beach Volleyball
action amazed the fans. China was up with a strong lead in the first set. The competitor side struggled to react to China’s heavy strike but they failed to create any spark on the podium. They could only look suspiciously at each others’ faces. Xue and Zhang
jumped on every little opportunity and registered points on the scoreboard. The pairing of Yupa/Kulna failed to put up with hard-hitting of strong rivals and suffered the loss of the first set. They could only help nine points, while Chinese team cruised past
to set-point. The first set ended with China’s victory at 21-9.
Second Set
Thailand’s duo felt the pain of dropping first set and stood up to fight the opponents with all their strength. Xue and Zhang were charged up with big-margin victory in first set and they were not so easy to deal with. However, Thai pair tried different
strategies and worked out better performance in second set. Their score improved in second set but still it was not enough to create a scare for the Chinese side. Xue and Zhang complimented each other perfectly and clawed their way to success in second set.
Yupa/Kulna touched 12-point’s mark but Xue/Zhang closed the set and declared match victory.
Zhang Xi was overjoyed with the hat-trick of Asian Beach Volleyball Titles. Talking of their success, she said, “We had a very good tactic which we used exactly in the competition. We played according to the pace that we decided on before the game. We were
confident that we could win, but Thailand had a strong team. They had great accuracy."
Bronze Medallists
Earlier in the day, the defending champions Usa Tenpaksee and Jarunee Sannok of Thailand collided with China’s Huang Ying and Yue Yuan in the bronze medal match. The Thai pair outshined with better performance and settled for the third position by sending
2-0 (21-19, 21-18).
The third-position match was a close fight between two contenders. Both sides traded lead time and again throughout the game. Thailand availed their chances and progressed with better score. The first set ended with Usa/Sannok’s victory at 21-19.
They second set also had some sort of symmetry with the first set. The score shifted up with a narrow gap and finally Usa/Sannok dug up 21-18 victory in second set.
Sannok was delighted with bronze medal victory. She said, "That was the last game for the season for us. Now it’s time to go on holiday and not think about anything else."
Tags: