Slovenia overcomes top rival Ukraine in Pool B match – Volleyball news
Women’s Junior National Volleyball Team of Slovenia gave a good reason of celebration to home audience on Friday by winning against Ukraine.
The match spanned over four sets, while Slovenia emerged as victorious team with 3-1 record. They claimed the opening set 25-13 but dropped the second frame with a narrow margin of two points 23-25. However, the Slovenian team showed consistency in the next
two sets and posted 25-16, 25-11, in order to grab victory.
It was more of a combined effort but the middle-blocker Elena KUCEJ drew special attention for her team-high 18 points. Her teammate Iza MLAKAR also contributed 18 points and shared the top-scorer’s spot with her. MLAKAR also registered 7 aces in the match.
Ukraine’s Elisaveta RUBAN was the top scorer on her side with a total of 14 points, which included 9 spikes and three aces.
Slovenia got off to a solid start in the game and influenced the rivals with convincing attacks and powerful serves. Ukrainian players took longer than usual to settle down in their positions, while Slovenia took the score by storm. KUCEJ came strong on
visiting team and hit the ball from different angles. Ukraine could only score 13 points and easily gave the set to Slovenia.
The second set of the match featured a closed competition. Ukraine followed a better game strategy after the loss of opening set and remained hand-in-hand with Slovenia. The see-saw battle of the two teams eventually ended at 25-23, while Ukraine was on
the winning side.
The game score tied at 1-1 after the second set, which was a sign of Ukrainian return in the game. However, the local heroines crushed their hopes by winning the third and four sets, and announced match victory.
Everyone on Slovenian team seemed quite delighted about the match victory and local mentor Bruno Najdic also shared the emotions.
He stated, “This was an important victory after the defeat we suffered yesterday against Croatia.”
He further added, “We had to pressure the Ukrainians with our service to make sure they were not going to score with their fast side-out. We were able to fulfil our goal even though we lost the second set, but still we took three points from this match which
is what really matters in the end. We can see that things are changing day by day here and so we have to stay concentrated also for the next matches because everything is possible, even to finish first in the group.”
In the next run, Slovenia will clash with Spanish team that has the similar 2-0 record in the tournament. Likewise, Ukraine will try it luck against Croatia in the next match on Saturday.
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