Russia defeated Egypt easily
in straight sets
 The
superior Russian team in all volleyball skills used their
rockets from their well known spike service to beat the
disturbed Egyptian team in straight sets 25-19, 25-8, 25-15. the
victory kept Russia at the top of the pool with 13 points while
Egypt stayed at the bottom with 7 points.
The Russian team started the match with the full power squad
with the returning back opposite Semen Poltavsky playing from
the start and the new libero Alexander Yanutov who didn’t play
in the third weekend in Cairo and also the centre Alexey
Kulesshov. Egypt started with some changes in the squad who
played in Cairo with the new Libero Ahmed Kamal starting and
Mohamed Ali who played from the start replacing the absent
centre Hossam Shaarawy.
Egypt started well disciplined with their tight block and
backline defense until the result reached to the draw 4-4, the
Russians used their big guns Pavel Abramov and Yurily Berezhko
to reach to 8-5 by the first technical time out. Again Russia
was superior through the tall centers Kuleshow and Alexei
Ostapenko to increase the points deficit to 16-9. Egypt tried to
use the fast attacks by the net through Mohamed Ali and Mohamed
El Sayed but they fall in many reception and service errors to
allow the Russians to win the set 25-19.
Abramov used his strong spike service to allow his team to lead
3-0, then Egypt arranged their combinations and used the spikes
of Saleh Fathy and Mohamed Gabal from position 2 but the Russian
block was superior. The Egyptian players fall again in many
reception and digging mistakes and failed too stop their
opponent rockets of Berezhko and abramov to widen the point
deficit to 16-3 by the STT. Although the Egyptian players
improved a little bit at the end of the set in spiking and
blocking yet the disturbed backline defense allowed the Russian
team to go through and win the set in a wider score 25-8.
In the third set the Russian coach used some bench players but
again Russia used the strong spike service of Poltavski at the
beginning of the set while the Egyptians lost many services to
allow Russia to lead 8-4. Egyptian coach made some sustituations
replacing some of the standing player putting Ali Husein as a
center and used the fast combinations from position 3 to bring
the score nearer. The Russian team maintained the attacking
performance and the spike service to win the third set 25-15 and
the match in straight sets.
Egypt head coach Grzegorz Rys considered the match the worst for
his team in the last two years specially in reception and
digging. “we don’t have this quality of service played by the
Russian player in our local league and so the match today was
actually a disaster for my players,” Said Rys in the press
conference after the match. “We hope to play better tomorrow
when we return back to our performance.
By Tarek Aladwar from Kazan,
Russia |
