Brazil as the present world champions, started their road for the fourth title in a row
Katowice, Poland, September 1, 2014- Defending Champions and World No 1 Brazil open their 2014 FIVB Men's World Championship campaign in the right foot after they beat Germany 3-0 (25-21, 25-19, 25-17) in their opening Pool B encounter in front of a passionate crowd at Spodek Hall in Katowice, Poland on Monday.
Key points
• Brazil's outside hitter Lucarelli topped the scorers with 13 points followed by Middle blocker Lucas 12 , while Germany's Gyogry Grozer topped the loser's list with 11.
• Brazil have won all six matches against German teams, two against the German Democratic Republic (GDR) and four against unified Germany (GER).
• Brazil are on a 16-match winning streak against (unified) Germany at Olympic Games, World Championships and World League, since two defeats in the 1993 World League.
• Brazil have won the last three World Championships and they can become the first team to win the trophy four times in a row.
• Brazil have won 25 of their last 29 World Championships matches.
• Germany have lost their last four matches at the World Championships. They had a longer losing streak (5) in 2006.
• Brazil had 11 successful blocks against 5 for Germany.
In the first set Germany ran up a 8-5 ahead, with Marcus Böhme and Denis Kaliberda grounding some fine spikes. Brazil’s Murilo and Sidaõ fought hard adding some points as well as Lucas and Ricardo blocked fierce German attacks. Thanks to them Brazil got into a comfortable lead 19-14 and even two aces in a row by György Grozer didn’t change the final score of the set, which Lucarelli ended 25-21 with a fierce spike.
The second set began with Brazil easily-made lead 6-3. After some strong serves by Lucarelli, Germany had problems with setting the ball, but they managed to add some points due to Brazil’s attack errors. With 7-7, Germany forced Brazilian coach to call a timeout. Throughout the set there were no more than two or three points between two teams, with Brazil going ahead. The situation changed in the ending of the set, when Germany’s technical errors and a great show of force presented by Lucarelli, Lucas and Murilo led Brazil to 25-19 victory.
Brazil displayed their domination also in the third set. Strong spikes at the very beginning of the set prevented Germany from making any lead. Even though Germany’s Sebastian Schwarz, Denys Kaliberda and György Grozer did their best, they were not able to change the scores much thus Brazil led 8-3 and comfortably controlled the game. Canarinhos with great serves by Lucas and huge spikes by Lucarelli, easily came to the end of the set, winning it 25-17 and the whole match 3-0.