Russia cruised to its fourth victory in the competition after defeating China in straight sets
Gdansk, Poland, September 6, 2014 - Russia scored a comfortable straight-set (25-22, 25-11, 25-21) win over China to strengthen their hold of the top spot in Pool C of the FIVB Volleyball Men's World Championship on Saturday.
Key Points
• Russia have already qualified to the next round since the third day.
• Russia are still unbeaten in Pool C, they only dropped a set against Mexico.
• Three Russian players scored in double figures, compared to their opponents who were unsuccessful to break the double-digit mark.
• Russia got nine points each on blocks and service aces.
Powerhouse Russia started extremely combative as they performed dynamic spikes from Dmitriy Ilinykh and Nikolay Pavlov. Russia jumped to an 8-4 lead at the first technical timeout. Russia moved strongly forward as Alexey Spiridonov and Nikolay Apalikov took care of the scoring for an 11-6 advantage.
China managed to get a hold of their game and made an enthusiastic comeback as they chose some tactical moves that increased the tempo of their game. China had a series of deadlocks with the Russians with some fantastic offence coming from their middle Geng Xin. Russia romped to a 22-19 score as Ilinykh stepped in to astound once again the Chinese defence. Russia finally stayed on track until the end for a 25-22 score.
Russia raced to a 7-3 run at the start of the second set as they added pressure on the Chinese defence. China looked helpless as the Russians continued with their attack barrage, increasing their lead to 14-7. Spiridonov’s aggressiveness posed more danger to the Chinese blockers as his combination plays punched through. Russia took full control of the match at 21-11 until Apalikov closed the set with a powerful kill 25-11.
Russia opened the third set with an 8-1 advantage. Dmitriy Muserskiy scored on three amazing service aces for Russia to hop to a 10-3 lead. China blundered on some plays that allowed Russia to orchestrate their powerful offence.
Chinese substitute Kou Zhichao tried to turn the course of events to their favour and successfully narrowed the gap to within just three points at 15-12. Kou’s stint on the court could not spark up a permanent run for China as Russia made their final moves to put away the match. Apalikov and Spiridonov combined for the final points that sealed the victory for Russia 25-21.