Athens Olympic champions China opened its FIVB Grand Prix 2007 campaign with a 3-1 loss to Russian arch rivals in Rzeszow, Poland on Friday.
Russia team took the lead from the very beginning, racing to 11-7 in the first set. The Chinese girls managed to level the score at 12-12 but still lost at 27-25 after a thrilling ending.
Jolted awake by the early setback, China started the second set on their own rules, gaining an initial three point advantage and going on to win the set at 25-21.
The beginning of the third set witnessed a Russian comeback as it didn't take them long to gain a 8-3 advantage at the first technical timeout while China seemed to have no response for the strong attack. A score of 25-16 was nothing but a natural consequence.
In the fourth set the Russian domination made the match a formality despite Chinese women were getting better. The Russians were leading at both technical timeouts (8-6 and 16-12) and stormed to 20-13. The Russians claimed the match with 25-15.
"I'm very happy, because I didn't expect my team to play that well. Now we must stay on that track. I know my players very well and together we'll try to continue such game tomorrow," Russia's Italian head coach Giovanni Caprara told a post match conference.
Source: Xinhua
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