The FIVB Volleyball World Grand Prix Macao 2017, organized by the Sports Bureau of the Macao SAR Government and the Volleyball Association of Macao, China and presented by Galaxy Entertainment Group, continued today (15 July) at the Macao Forum.  Italy dealt USA their first loss in this year’s FIVB Volleyball World Grand Prix by edging the decider (25-22, 22-25, 25-21, 13-25, 15-13), while China battled to their first win this weekend by overcoming Turkey by three sets to one (25-23, 19-25, 25-23, 25-23) in front of the rapturous home crowd.

The opening match was a seesaw battle in which Italy twice led the match by taking the first and third sets but each time the USA found an answer by taking the second and fourth sets.  In the end, Italy edged the thrilling deciding set by two points despite committing several serving errors, making it two consecutive wins this weekend. 

Paola Ogechi Egonu scored an impressive 31 points for Italy, while Madison Kingdon and Michelle Bartsch-Hackley tallied 20 points each for the losing side.

After the match, Italy’s coach Davide Mazzanti said, “It was definitely a difficult match.  We had problems with our reception which of course made it hard for us to attack, but the match was such a great lesson for our team.”  USA’s coach Karch Kiraly also sang his praises for the opponents, “Italy are playing good volleyball this weekend.  These matches are not fun to lose, but they are really fun to compete in, and it was the fierce competition that makes both teams better.”

In the second match of the day, Turkey got off to a flying start in set one and was leading 13-8 at the midway point, but China fought back with Zhu Ting, Yuan Xinyue and Ding Xia to claim the opener.  The second set was a reverse with China starting the set well but gave away points in serving and blocking error.  The third and fourth sets are a very close affair; China executed the key points better than their opponents to secure the victory.

Li Jing top scored for China with 22 points and Yuan Xinyue added 19 points for the winning side.  Meliha Ismailoglu scored 17 for Turkey.

China’s coach An Jiajie praised their opponents during the post-match conference, “Turkey have improved tremendously under the new coach with their tactical play and today they gave us a lot of difficulties especially in blocking and attack.  For us there were still too many ups and downs throughout the match, and I feel we could improve further with more consistency in our play.” Turkey’s coach Giovanni Guidetti was proud of his team’s performance, “We made a big step forward today by fighting till the end.  We have found a lot of solutions to our game which we did not find yesterday.  I am happy that our young team is able to match the level of play of China and we can surely take away many positives from this match.”

The last day of the competition will see Italy play Turkey at 1300, followed by the highly anticipated China v USA game at 1530.