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Weekend 5
Egypt swept China in
straight sets
 Cairo,
Egypt, July 12, 2008- The superstar Ahmed Salah used his
unstoppable hits to allow Egypt to edge China 3-0
(25-15, 25-22, 25-17) in 74 minutes in front of about
4000 excited spectators in the second match of the fifth
weekend of the intercontinental round of the 2008 World
League here at Police Union Hall in Cairo, Egypt on
Saturday. The Egyptian team appeared with a completely
different performance than the first match and
overwhelmed the situation all through to win their
fourth World League match that improved their win- Loss
record to 4-6, while china dropped to 5-5
Aided by the excited spectators the Egyptian team scored
four successive points that put them 4-0 ahead after a
group of efficient spikes from Ahmed Salah forcing the
Chinese coach to call an early timeout. The superstar
Salah continued his unstoppable hits that allowed Egypt
to continue leading 8-2 at the first technical timeout
(FTT). China started to arrange the block against the
Egyptian attacks through the middle blocker Dawei Yu and
decreased the point deficit to 10-5. The Egyptian
reception was much better than allowed them to build up
the attacks to the wing spikers that was used well by
Mohamed Badawy and Salah and Egypt doubled the score
16-8 at the second technical timeout (STT). China tried
to improve their backline defense against the Egyptian
attacks but they failed to face the unstoppable Egyptian
rockets that finished the first set 25-15.
In the second set China started to use the fast attacks
through the middle blockers and also improved the
reception and digging and succeeded to stay near Egypt
till they had the first lead at the FTT 8-7. Egypt
regained the first set performance and led 13-10 after a
group of skillful setting from Ashraf Aboul Hassan and
continued to use the block of Ahmed Mosaad and Abdel
Latif Otham to stay ahead 16-15 at the STT. Again Badawy
and the Salah increased with their concentrated hits the
point deficit to 23-19. China improved a lot their block
and defense through the efficient libero Qi Ren and
deceased the difference, but with an unstoppable spike
from Saleh Fathy Egypt ended the set 25-22.
The third set was the most competitive at the start as
the Chinese setter Fudong Jiang started to lead the
combinations by the net to back raw players and also to
the wing spikers Shi and Yingchao Fang and the set went
point by point by point till Egypt led 8-7 at the FTT.
Egypt improved a lot afterwards and again Saleh Fathy
and Salah spiked away from the reach of Chinese block as
Egypt increased the score to 16-10 at the STT. China
struggled to save the match and improved their attacks
for a while but again Egypt led completely the net
action to lead steadily till they won the set 25-17
Press Conference
We improved our reception and block a lot today, Zakaria
Egypt
Egypt head coach, Ahmed Zakaria:
There was a big difference between the performance today
and yesterday because we arranged today our block and
improved the reception and these were our main problems
in the first match. I think we succeeded to relief our
stress and overload of the players and also we had a
meeting with the players to correct their mood and we
succeeded to win the match widely although we l;ost
today our main setter Abdalla Abdel Salam due to
shoulder injury and also the outstanding middle blocker
Mohamed Ali. I intended also to give rest to the team
captain Hamdy El Safi before the last weekend against
Poland. I’m happy today with the performance of our
middle blocker Ahemd Mosaad.
Egypt team captain, Hamdy El Safi:
Yesterday we didn’t platy well and I think today we
corrected all our mistakes. Our strongest points today
were the reception and the block. We did our best today
to make something positive for our team in front of our
spectators and I’m happy to achieve this fourth victory.
China
China head coach, Zhou Jianan:
Today we changed some main players because they did a
big effort in the 5 weekends of the World League and we
needed to give some rest to the standing players and
also to relief the others for the injury. Our main goal
of this competition is to prepare the entire player to
the Olympic Games and to give the chance to some reserve
players to make the coordination between all the team
members.
China team captain, Shen Qiong:
I congratulate Egypt for the victory and also the great
performance today. They worked well all through the
match and succeeded to dominate the net by their block
and also the defense through the better reception.
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