Thailand claims first win in Pool F of the 2012 FIVB Grand Prix – Volleyball news
Women’s national volleyball team from Thailand opened the second round of the 2012 FIVB Grand Prix with an impressive win over Puerto Rico on Friday.
Thai ladies worked out an amazing performance and clinched success in four-set match, 3-1 (25-18, 19-25, 25-11, 25-19). Park Arena Komaki in Japanese city Komaki hosted the opening match of Pool F and around 500 people witnessed the action. Victory enabled
Thailand to take 3rd position on the ranking chart, while Puerto Rico remained at No. 13 after the loss.
Thailand’s success was mainly credited to Onuma Sittirak, who contributed match-high 21 points. Leading Puerto Rico was Sarai Alvarez, who bagged 13 in the match.
The match started out with a balanced action from sides. Thailand hit with power, while Puerto Rico responded in the same tone. As a result the score tied at 10-all.
However, Thailand managed to push the rival side behind and took control of the operations after second TTO. Opening set ended at 25-18 and Thailand improved to 1-0.
Puerto Rican team showed good fighting spirit in the next set and posted 25-19 on board, which levelled the game score. In the tie-breaker third set, Thailand dominated and held off Puerto Rico for 25-11 win. Puerto Rican hopes died when Thailand captured
fourth set at 25-19 and announced match victory.
The head coach of Puerto Rico David Aleman opined that strong serves of the opposite team made a difference in the match. Furthermore, he blamed his team for a poor job at reception. Nonetheless, he urged his team to look forward and to overcome the flaws
in the coming matches. He showed great determination to win the next match against Japan on Saturday.
His Thai counterpart Radchatagriengkai Kiattipong also shared his views about the match. He stated, “Today’s game was difficult, as Puerto Rico played with high spirits; they played hard. They have strong blocking and spiking, but I congratulate my players
on their win today. We’ll try to do our best tomorrow, and we wish the Puerto Rico team good luck for the next match too.”
“Today we’re very happy to win. We tried to do our best for each point, but the Puerto Rico team was very good and made it hard to get points. We’ll try to do our best in the next game, and we wish the Puerto Rico team good luck in their next game,” said
the skipper of Thailand Wilavan Apinyapong.
Winning Thai squad will return to action on Saturday when it takes on Dominican Republic. On the other hand, Puerto Rico is scheduled to take on Japan in the next match.
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