Pool phase closes successfully in Tijuana and Mexicali at FIVB Men's U21

The pool phase closed successfully in both venues, the High Performance Centre and the State Auditorium at FIVB Men’s U21 World Championship.

Russia had another unstoppable performance. This time the defending champions won in three sets against the United States and closed as leader in Pool B.

The team coached by Mkhail Nikolaev showed a dominant and powerful performance by winning with scores of 25-17, 25-17 and 25-15. Maxim Belogortcev and Sergei Pirainen scored 10 points apiece for the Russian team while Jeffrey Jendryk closed with 9 for The United States.

Brazil 3-1 China
Brazilians were also among the teams that kept their undefeated streak on the first round. The squad coached by Leonardo Carvalho prevailed over China in four sets, after the Asians had a third set comeback. Scores were 26-24, 25-22, 23-25 and 25-22. Libin Liu scored 17 points for China as best scorer of the match, followed by Zhejia Zhang with 15, the same number of points tallied by Brazilian Rodrigo Leao, while Douglas Souza finished with 14 as well as Caio Oliveira.

Brazilian defense was key with 39 digs registered during the match, despite the 13-7 blocking advantage managed by China. Brazil also closed with 10 collective aces against 6 by China.

Turkey 3-0 Egypt
In Tijuana Turkey clinched a berth to the next round at FIVB Men’s U21 World Championship and even got the honors to finish the first phase as one of the most consistent teams. Actions on Sunday began with the Turkish victory over Egypt (30-28, 25-15, 25-18). Yasin Aydin commanded the actions for Turkey by totalizing 16 points, while Osman Cagatay Durmaz closed with 8. Saad Ahmed scored 11 for Egypt, while Mohamed Seliman finished with 6.

Slovenia 3-2 France
Slovenia showed their quality as part of the best European teams of the competition by defeating France 3-2 (25-22, 25-22, 21-25, 23-25, 20-18).

Ziga Donik registered 22 points for the Slovenian squad, while Toncek Stern tallied 19. Jan Kozamernik had 15 points and Matej Kök scored 13 units, as the Balcanic team finished with four players with double digit.

Jean Patry had his best performance at the tournament with 30 points for France. Timothée Carle played the first twe sets as substitute, but started in the last three to achieve 23 units. Unfortunately, France suffered their second defeat at the tournament.

Italy 3-1 Japan
Italy dominated Japan in four sets by scores of 25-20, 23-25, 30-28 and 25-12 and earned 9 points to finish ahead of Pool D. Tiziano Mazzone, Andrea Argenta and Oreste Cavuto were the top scorers of the Italian team. Mazzone tallied 14, while Argenta closed with 13 and Cavuto  12. On the Japanese side, Ataru Kumakura totalized 14 points. Yuki Higuchi finished with 13 and Taishi Onodera registered 10. Italy served well to control their Asian rival with a final 4-2 advantage and got 42 points by errors in 1 hour and 52 minutes.

Argentina 3-1 Poland
Argentina advanced to the second round of the FIVB Men’s U21 World Championship after prevailing over Poland in four sets (32-30, 16-25, 26-24, 25-20). Gaston Fernandez finished with 16 points, while Bruno Lima closed wiith 14, the same as Brian Melgarejo. Meanwhile, Joaquin Gallego tallied 11 units.

Bartlomiej Lipinski was the best scorer of the match with 21 points for Poland, that surrendered 31 by error, while Argentina gave up 25. Pawel Halaba had 16 kills and Polish captain Aleksander Sliwka recorded 13.

Iran 3-1 Cuba
Iran finally clinched their first victory at the FIVB Men’s U21 World Championship by defeating Cuba in three sets. The pupils of Farhad Nafarzadeh won 3-1 (18-25, 25-17, 25-18, 25-18) in 1 hour and 41 minutes. Amin Esmaelilnezhad was the best offensive player of the Iranian team by scoring 20 points, 14 of them with powerfull spikes. He also recorded four points by blocking the Cuban attack and aced two times. Saeed Javaheri had 16 tallies, including 3 blocks and 2 aces. Cuba started the game well, but heir mistakes made them lost. Their best player was Luis Sosa doing a great job by scoring 12 points, while Osmany Uriarte tallied 10 units.

Canada 3-0 Mexico
Canada claimed their second victory and the second place of Pool A after defeating hosts Mexico 3-0 (25-17, 25-20, 25-20).

The Canadian team had Ryan Nickifor as their best scorer with 23 points, followed by Brandon Koppers with 9. Ridl Alexis Garay was the best of Mexico with 11 points, while Alan Gabriel Martinez finished with 9 units.

Mexico surrendered 26 points in errors, while Canada gave up 18. Serving and blocking were two fundamentals things that the team coached by John Barrett worked on to grab the ticket as the only Norceca representative team in second round.