Manama, Bahrain, July 20, 2019 – Iran played determined against the Czech Republic as they recorded a 3-0 (29-27, 25-18, 26-24) to finish second in Pool C of the FIVB Volleyball Men’s U21 World Championship.
Iran coach Ataei Nouri Behrouz: “All the teams are going to be very strong (in the second round). We try to analyse the teams to prepare for our own tactics.
“We have star players like (Morteza) Sharifi and (Amirhossein) Esfandiar who trained in the senior team and did not have good training and preparation together with us, which was one of our problems.
“We are here to win a medal. Two years ago, we were fifth place in the Czech Republic. At U21 level, Iran volleyball have only one bronze medal in Morocco in 2007. Now we want to take a medal and hope we can be champions.”
Iran captain Amirhossein Esfandiar: “We did very well in the match. We knew it would be hard because both teams needed to win to go to the next round. Our team played better today. Now we are in the top eight and we want to go to the semifinals, then next we will think about the final.”
Czech Republic coach Jan Svoboda: “Congratulations to Iran. They were a little better. It was very close match with only two-point difference in two sets. Iran were better on the service in the important moments of the match and that is why they won. We fought today to go into the group of the first eight, but now we must fight to finish in ninth.”
Czech Republic captain Ondrej Piskacek: “The result was 3-0, but every set, especially the first and last, were decided by very small margins. I think that was our mistake. We now play ninth to 16th place. We have not lost our motivation but it is harder to play because we know we are a good team and should be in a better position, but I hope we can keep on fighting.”
Quick links - Volleyball:
FIVB Volleyball Men's U21 World Championship Bahrain 2019
FIVB.com - Volleyball
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