Mexico earned their first victory after a hard, long match against Egypt
Gdansk, Poland, September 7, 2014 – Mexico regained their confidence in the tiebreaker to upset Egypt 3-2 (16-26, 25-20, 25-21, 21-25, 15-10) to earn a victory in Pool C of the FIVB Volleyball Men’s World Championship at the Ergo Arena on Sunday.
Key Points
• Mexico scored three straight points in the final set that were crucial to their first victory in the competition.
• Mexico ended their journey at the World Championship in fifth place in Pool C.
• Daniel Vargas’ 20 points was enough to give victory for the Mexican squad, even though Egypt’s Ahmed Abdelhay topped all scorers with 24 points.
• Although block and service points were close for both squads, Vargas and Samuel Cordova each scored six block points on a winning effort.
Egypt and Mexico started the match with an exchange of attacks, resulting to a close fight in the early part of the set. Then Egypt began to find their rhythm and started to pull away at the 10-7 mark. Abdelhay powered the Egyptian offence for a more comfortable lead at 18-11 until the Egyptian opposite made some final effort to close the first set 25-16.
Mexico showed more energy in the second set to keep up with the Egyptian serve, but they former can only hold this energy briefly as the Egypt unleashed powerful attacks. They managed somehow to cut down the lead later in the set from the Mexican blocking tandem of Vargas and Cordova, who also spearheaded their offence to gain the lead at 23-20. Egypt lost its focus and conceded the set to the Mexicans 25-20.
Mexico’s brilliance at the net flourished and stopped the Egyptian offence. Egypt likewise struggled on their defence allowing Mexico to roll up the score 16-14 at the second technical timeout. Mexico replaced its starting setter to run up their offence and successfully produced good plays for their attackers. Mexico took control of the set as Jorge Barajas’ attacks misled the Egyptian defenders. Cordova followed it up with his own set of attacks to close the set 25-20.
Egypt took a big lead 8-3 in the fourth set, bringing back the momentum to their side. Mexico managed to force Egypt to commit some errors to cut down the lead 15-10. Mohamed Elhalim led the Egypt’s offensive drive, while Vargas and captain Carlos Guerra countered for a much closer gap at 20-18. Islam Abdelkader’s service ace sparked the run for Egypt to finally clinch the set at 25-21 and force Mexico to play the tiebreaker.
Mexico led 3-1 in the final set but their defenders were hounded by the presence of Abdelhay on the attack line. The Egyptian hitter answered all exchange in points to stop the Mexicans from pulling away. The score remained tight but Mexico got some breathing space to lead at 11-9. Mexico scored the last three points from a Vargas attack, a Barajas ace and an unfortunate attack error from Abdelhay to secure the match victory.