Christmas day for Orthodox churches carries triple victory for Russian teams

2009/2010 CEV Indesit Champions League

Luxembourg, January 7, 2010. On the Christmas Day for all Eastern Orthodox Churches, the Russian Volleyball family contributed to the peaceful atmosphere of such holidays with a triple victory tonight in the CEV Indesit Champions League. Zenit KAZAN cruised past the French guys of TOURS VB in fourth set in what was quite a special evening for Russian mentor Vladimir Alekno who resumed back to his former club where he excelled both as a player and as a coach. Moreover, Zarechie ODINTSOVO finally interrupted the negative trend of this season to score a convincing three-setter against the Romanian champions of Metal GALATI. Universitet BELGOROD completed that delightful night finding the right energy to seize the tie-break in the away match against ZOK RIJEKA. Surprisingly Italy’s CoprAtlantide PIACENZA lost once again in Greece against Panathinaikos and the team that finished second back in the 2007/2008 season will veritably miss the qualification for the Playoffs 12.

Results

Men
Unicaja ALMERIA (ESP) vs. CSKA SOFIA (BUL) 3:0 (25-18, 25-17, 25-22)
TOURS VB (FRA) vs. Zenit KAZAN (RUS) 1:3 (25-20, 25-27, 23-25, 23-25)
Panathinaikos ATHENS (GRE) vs. CoprAtlantide PIACENZA (ITA) 3:1 (22-25, 25-22, 29-27, 25-20)

Women
ZOK RIJEKA (CRO) vs. Universitet BELGOROD (RUS) 2:3 (18-25, 16-25, 25-15, 25-23, 11-15)
Zarechie ODINTSOVO (RUS) vs. Metal GALATI (ROU) 3:0 (25-21, 25-20, 25-21)

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Men

In spite of a pretty good performance, TOURS VB did not finalize its quest and eventually had to leave the way open to the Russians of Zenit KAZAN tonight on home soil. Alexey Cheremisin was the best scorer of the match with 22 points, whereas David Konecny and Earvin Ngapeth topped the count for the hosts with 21 and 20 respectively. In the first set, TOURS VB displayed some great blocks to stop the attacks of the opponents and Ngapeth performed strongly in attack. The remaining three sets were extremely tight and TOURS VB left the court with some regrets since the French did not score the decisive rallies to have a try at last at the tie-break. After four legs Zenit is still undefeated and progresses mightily along the way to the Playoffs, whereas TOURS VB will have to battle with CSKA SOFIA and Unicaja ALMERIA for the second spot. French coach Eric Ngapeth said after the match: “The victory tonight was within reach but the major international experience of the Russians ultimately prevailed”.

Looking for staying alive in the competition Unicaja ALMERIA resumed tonight to the “Moses Ruiz” competition hall as if the team was going to play a final match. The Spaniards started off quite nervously, but the local guys promptly reacted to set the pace all the way through. Setter Josh Howatson was decisive as he cleverly distributed balls among his spikers. The third set was extremely tight. CSKA SOFIA didn’t give up, the score turned around continuously but with 80% of efficiency in attack for American Matthew Denmark Unicaja eventually closed the match in three sets. Spanish coach Carlos Carreño said: “We attained our objective, all the players played at a very high level, including the ones that normally don’t play too much, and now we have to continue to perform that way, even though we have a difficult match against Zenit KAZAN coming up next week”. Bulgarian mentor Aleksandar Popov added: “I do not have much to say, Unicaja tonight was simply much better than us”.

The “green” supporters created an amazing atmosphere tonight in Glyfada and helped out Panathinaikos in seizing the game against CoprAtlantide PIACENZA of Italy (22-25, 25-22, 29-27, 20-25). There were many supporters for the first time this year in the “M. Liougkas” competition hall since the Champions League match came right before a real derby featuring the girls of Panathinaikos and Olympiacos PIRAEUS for the 1/8 finals of the GM Capital Challenge Cup. Both teams were full of anxiety at the beginning of the match. Panathinaikos played better up to the mid of the set with Agamez in great shape but PIACENZA took advantage of the errors coming from the hosts to clinch the set 25-22. The second set began just like the first. Good blocks built up a provisional lead for Panathinaikos but the Italian team came back with Marshall and the score after the first technical time out moved up point by point. Many errors came from both sides in the serving area but with the clever tactics of setter Zagumny Panathinaikos tied the set count. Christofidelis opened the third set with a couple of aces and a furious Italian coach took a time out to wake up his guys. Score had some ups and downs, when after two ties at 23 and 25 and some amazing Volleyball actions, Panathinaikos prevailed at 29-27. The fourth set is just for… history! Panathinaikos displayed the right mix of energy and passion. On the other hand, PIACENZA lost the concentration and also the opportunity to stay alive to qualify for the Playoffs. After the end of the match, Greek coach Stelios Kazazis said: “Congratulations to all my players. We overcame the problems and defeated for a second time a club with a huge history in Europe”.

Women

ZOK RIJEKA of Croatia played convincingly in front of their home audience but eventually failed to maintain the right pace in the decisive tie-break against Universitet BELGOROD of Russia. This is the fourth defeat in a row for the Croats who last year made it to the Playoffs but for the 2009/2010 season seem to have very slim chances to repeat that feat. Serbian star Anja Spasojevic did not compete yesterday night for Universitet since she is still suffering some pain on her left knee. Aleksandra Milosavljevic commented for the home team: “After such a demanding match I’d love to go for a long sleep, but I can say that we played pretty well tonight. It is difficult to play against teams such as Universitet as you trailed from 2 sets down. The fifth set was very tough and a couple of mistakes in reception decided the final outcome of the game”. Coach Igor Lovrinov added: “I am not satisfied since this was an ideal opportunity to score a victory”.

In Pool D Zarechie ODINTSOVO demolished tonight the Romanians of Metal GALATI to score its first victory in the 2009/2010 CEV Indesit Champions League to have hence still a chance to qualify for the Playoffs. After a good start of the guests (0:5) the Russians regained full control of the match; Brazilian stars Walewska and Paula Pequeno performed very solidly in blocking, Tatiana Kosheleva brought the well-needed points in attack (25-21). Zarechie showed a real dominance throughout the second set to close it with an ace (25-20). In the third set the Russians got the decisive break right after the second technical break (19:15) and a block of the above mentioned Brazilian duo finished the job. Russian captain Maria Zhadan commented: “The start of the match wasn’t very successful for our team. Hovever, we managed to control the final section of the sets and eventually to get the victory. We have been working really hard over the last weeks, we have been practicing at home at the beginning of January and managed to be back in a good shape. I hope that we will also win the next game.” Branko Kovacevic, coach of Metal GALATI, added: “We didn’t have any game in the last three weeks and this did not help our team. The girls are not in their best condition, tonight we didn’t show even half of our potential. That is why the victory of Zarechie was quite easy tonight.”