PREOLÍMPICO MASCULINO EUROPEO - ITALIA CLASIFICA A LONDRES

[Lloyd]

Serbia y Espa~a se juegan la vida hoy, si espa~a pierde ya esta cuasi eliminada (no podran con Bulgaria de seguro) y si pierde Serbia ya pueden hacer las maletas para el POM. Slovenia y Finlandia ya estan eliminados. Me da pena por Finlandia merecen ir al POM pero por Ranking no pueden .

[IVAN JIMMY]

25-19 serbia 17-10 serbia

[Lloyd]

Serbia gana el partido contra espa~a 3-1 (25-19, 25-17, 23-25, 25-22). Serbia al menos respira tranquilo por hoy, pero esto era para terminarlo en un 3-0, no extenderlo tontamente, por poco y se van al 5to set , pero al menos ganaron .

[toche]

Partidos de Semifinales

Bulgaria 1 Alemania 3
22 - 25
25 - 20
22 - 25
16 - 25

Italia 3 Serbia 1 revancha cobrada de la final del europeo
25 - 14
25 - 19
19 - 25
25 - 16

[toche]

Domingo 13-05
Final por la clasificación olímpica
Alemania vs Italia
Forza Azurra

[Lloyd]

Desde que se cayo el foro a sucedido de todo .

Italia troncho el sue~o olimpico de los Slovakos con un 3-0 (25-23, 25-13, 25-22), Bulgaria aplasto a Spein con un 3-0 (25-16, 25-20, 25-16) y le ayudo a Serbia a llegar a la semifinal... para ser aplastados por los Italianos 3-1 (como en el WC) (25-14, 25-19, 19-25, 25-16), y los Alemanes le aguaron la fiesta a los Bulgaros con un 3-1 (25-22, 20-25, 25-22, 25-16), y la Republica Checa esta celebrando pq iran al POM gracias a que solo necesitaban que Italia o Alemania campeonaran y los dos llegaron a la final. Mientras que el sue~o Olimpico de Finlandia y Slovakia quedaron liquidados.

Ya los Bulgaros no tendra fiesta nacional y no tendran mas remedio que hacerle barra a los Alemanes.
Ahora los Serbios le van a tener que hacer barra a los Alemanes, sino, bye bye Londres, hola Rio 2016.

[Lloyd]

Grupo A

Grupo B

[Lloyd]

Italy moves on to the final in Sofia after a 3-1 against Serbia
2012 Olympic Games - European Qualification

Sofia, Bulgaria, May 12, 2012. Italy became the first team to make it to tomorrow’s final of the 2012 Olympic Games - European Qualification for men in Bulgaria. The team of head coach Mauro Berruto knocked Serbia out of the tournament with a final score 3:1 (25-14, 25-19, 19-25, 25-16) in the first semifinal, played in front of thousands of spectators in Arena Armeec hall, among which CEV President André Meyer, the President of the Serbian Volleyball Federation and CEV Senior Vice President Aleksandar Boričić and the President of the German Volleyball Federation Werner von Moltke.

Live photo gallery of all matches is running in real time here

Italy completely prevailed in the first set. With powerful serving and insurmountable blocking, the team of Mauro Berruto was playing cat-and-mouse with the Serbs and eventually won the set with a huge point differential – 25-14.

As if demotivated by the absence of a strong opponent on the other side of the net, the Italians made many unforced errors in the second set. However, they were able to put more focus on their attacks, especially through Michal Lasko, and once again dominated on the court to close the set at 25-19.

Italy maintained a small lead through the second technical time-out of the third set and seemed to be approaching a straight-set victory, when suddenly the Serbs woke up, realizing they had nothing more to lose. Some fantastic serving by Aleksandar Atanasijevic and a great job done by the Serbian block helped the team take over the rest of the set and finish at a 6-point margin.

The perfect ending of set 3, however, was not enough for Igor Kolakovic’s players to regain their confidence and in set 4 they were once again not able to stay in contention. The more experienced Italians took advantage of the many mistakes in Serbia’s performance and had no problems building up a 9-point gap for the final 25-16 in the set.

Ivan Zaytsev was the game’s best scorer with 22 points, with Michal Lasko adding another 19 on Italy’s account. Aleksandar Atanasijevic was the most prolific player of the Serbian team with 15 points.

“Italy made a very, very strong game today. Our team was far from its best and although we showed some energy and skill in the third set, it was not enough to win and qualify for the final,” Bojan Janic, captain of Serbia, stated after the match. “We are very happy about the victory, because Serbia is always a tough opponent,” his Italian counterpart Cristian Savani said. ”Today we showed our best volleyball and made it clear that we are ready for tomorrow’s battle for the first place.”

Igor Kolakovic, head coach of Serbia, commented: “Today Italy was better than us and deserved to win. We managed to play at a satisfactory level for just one set, which was obviously not enough for a positive result. The tournament is over for us and we are turning our minds to the next chances for qualifying for the Olympics and to the World League.” Italian mentor Mauro Berruto was pleased with the result: “We are happy that we won and moved on to the next and final step here. Six months ago our two teams met in the final of the CEV European Championship and we lost, but today we got our rematch. We are motivated to give our best tomorrow, whoever our opponent is going to be.”

[Lloyd]

Grozer shines as Germany knocks Bulgaria out of tomorrow’s final
2012 Olympic Games - European Qualification

Sofia, Bulgaria, May 12, 2012. Italy vs. Germany has been set as tomorrow’s final of the 2012 Olympic Games - European Qualification for men in Bulgaria. With an incredible performance by German opposite György Grozer the team of head coach Vital Heynen achieved a sensational victory over heavy favorites Bulgaria by 3:1 (25-22, 20-25, 25-22, 25-16) in the second semifinal in a packed Arena Armeec hall. The President of Bulgaria Rosen Plevneliev and the Prime Minister Boyko Borisov were among the thousands of Bulgarian fans that watched an interesting battle, but ended up disappointed by their team’s broken Olympic hopes.

Live photo gallery of all matches is running in real time here

Germany played a fantastic first set. Some powerful serving, especially by György Grozer, gave the Bulgarian reception a lot of hard time and, whenever the home team was able to organize its attack, the German defense was there to dig out even the toughest balls. This way Vital Heynen's side ran away to a 7-point lead at 16-9. Although with the help of Matey Kaziyski’s strong serves Bulgaria narrowed the gap down to 12-16, its block was not able to stop Grozer’s spikes and the Germans reestablished their advantage at 20-13. A superb performance in offense, serving and defense by young talent Nikolay Penchev, who came in as a sub, once again helped the home team almost catch up at 19-21, but Germany held on to its lead and closed the set at 25-22.

Kaziyski’s technique completely outclassed the German block in the second set. Bulgaria rushed to an 8-4 lead, but then made too many serving errors. Combined with Denis Kaliberda’s contribution in offense, it allowed Germany to flip the score in its own favor to 16-14 at the second technical time-out. Inspired by the crowd, the Lions quickly recovered. Penchev’s performance in reception and serving was more than impressive while Kaziyski and Vladimir Nikolov continued to pressure the opponent with their spikes to lead Bulgaria to a final 25-20 in the set.

Kaziyski’s fabulous performance in offense and also from the serving line continued into the third set and helped Bulgaria recover from an early German lead and gain a comfortable advantage at 18-14. But then it was time for Grozer to serve and for Bulgaria to make too many mistakes. With 7 points in a row Germany took the lead by 21-18 and did not let go through the end – 25-22.

The story of the fourth set may be summoned in one sentence: György Grozer destroyed Bulgaria. An out-of-this-world performance by the German opposite put an end to the home team’s hopes to make it to the Olympics from tomorrow’s final. A confused Bulgarian team could not find a way to cope with the situation while Grozer scored a total of 15 points (2 aces, 3 kill blocks and 10 in attack) in this set only for a final 25-16 that sent Germany to the direct battle for a ticket to London tomorrow.

To no one’s surprise, György Grozer became the top scorer of the match with an incredible tally of 30 points. Matey Kaziyski with 22 points was Bulgaria’s most prolific player, while captain Vladimir Nikolov added another 18. “Congratulations for Germany! They won one decisive and very tough game,” Nikolov stated after the match. ”They managed to handle the pressure and proved to be the better team on the court. We played approximately well, but we made one big mistake that cost us not only the third set, but also the whole game.” His German counterpart Björn Andrae was in the opposite mood: “I am very happy and proud of my team. We managed to win a great game in front of so many spectators here in Sofia. It was not easy, but we kept our concentration during the whole game and showed some very nice volleyball, even when we were behind in the score.”

“Our opponent deserved the victory. They showed high-class volleyball tonight, but in my opinion until the end of the third set, both teams had equal chance to win the game,” Radostin Stoytchev, head coach of Bulgaria, commented. ”The lack of experience in our team was the key to our loss. We failed in one rotation in the third set. In the next part of the game there was only one team on court and it was Germany.” “I want to thank all my players, who played very good volleyball against one of the best teams in Europe,” Germany’s head coach Vital Heynen said. ”I think we were also a little bit lucky tonight after winning the third set. There is one more game left and we will give our best to win it and qualify for the Olympics in our first try.”

[Lloyd]

Italia y Alemania merecian llegar a la final, fueron los mejores equipos de este PO. Bulgaria ya no es el mismo del 2007-08, solo tuvo suerte de que le toco un equipo flojo sino.... y Serbia dio lastima , sin Ivan el terrible no son nada. Me acuerdo cuando algunos lo daban por ganador de las olimpiadas, en fin. Finlandia a mejorado mucho lastima que le tocara un grupo tan fuerte y Slovakia tambien a mejorado. Slovenia y Spein.... equipos de relleno .

Italia es el favorito por a verle ganado a los Alemanes en la ronda de grupos, pero esto es una final y todo puede pasar, pues que gane el me... bueno los dos son los mejores de este torneo, asi que gane el mas inteligente. .