Russia beat Korea in second round opener – 2011 FIVB Boys’ Youth World Championship
The city of Almirante Brown in Argentina hosted a great match between Russia and Korea on Wednesday, August 24, where the Russian team bagged a hard-earned victory in five sets. The Boys’ National Youth Volleyball Team of Russia, under the command of head coach Vladimir Kondra, displayed a stellar performance and posted a 3-2 (25-20, 19-25, 18-25, 25-16, and 15-10) win over Korea. It was an exciting match in Pool H and created a lot of buzz in the stands.
Match synopsis
The Russians started out with good energy and added quick points in the opening set. Despite errors, Russia jumped to an 8-3 lead at the first technical timeout. Korean Gyeong-Bok Na put up a good fight for his team and shortened the gap of points through his counter-attack. However, the clever passes and fast spikes of the Russian players helped them stay ahead of Korea. The second technical timeout was called when Russia was 4-points ahead of their opponents. Korea experimented with different strategies but could not save the opening set as Russia was better with the final score of 25-20.
Korea grasped the game plan of Russia and demonstrated a levelled fight in the second set. The charged-up Russian scored 8-7 at the FTT and tried to maintained dominance on the rival side. Nonetheless, the Koreans refused to take any pressure and defended well against Russia’s strike. The good attack of Korean captain, Myung-Geun Song, enabled his team to change the scenario with a 2-point lead at 16-14. Russia was still trying to come-back in the game but Korea closed off second the set with 25-19 victory.
Koreans seemed to be out of troubled wasters and attacked in the third set. They picked up an early lead of 8-7 and further converted it into 16-12 at the second technical timeout. They extended their lead to 2-1 by winning the fourth set 25-18.
Korea was on top of the game after winning two sets in row but suffered the set-back in fourth set due to reception errors. Russia got the perfect opportunity to bounce back in the game and threw everything into the attack. They benefitted from the opponents’ mistakes and hit the equaliser by capturing fourth set.
After a deadlock of 2-2, the game entered the fifth and decisive set and both teams seemed under a lot of pressure. Russia was lucky to take a two-point advantage at 8-6 and widened the gap further. Korea could only score 10 points in the fifth set, while Russia achieved the match points and won the battle.
Post-match comments
Vladimir Manerov, the Russian skipper was delighted with their first win of the second round. He said they had a really good time playing against Korea. The last set of the match was the real key to Russia’s success in his view. The Head Coach, Vladimir Kondra, made good remarks about the Korean team and stated that he liked the way they played in the match.
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