Romania vs Belgium 0:3 First taste of success at the European Games was on…

Romania vs Belgium 0:3

First taste of success at the European Games was on stake today in the clash between Romania and Belgium as both teams had lost their first encounters to Azerbaijan and Italy respectively. The Yellow Tigers won 3-0.

The battle to get a way into the tournament began as even as you could have predicted it. None of the teams were able to take control of the set, but luckily for Belgium, they had Lise Van Hecke. The 22-year old opposite was here, there, and everywhere an opening to score a point showed itself. She made impressive 10 points in the first set, before Sarah Cools with some serious kill blocking wrapped it up 25-21.

Belgium’s setter Ilka Van de Vyver set the tone of the second set as she orchestrated her team’s attacks. Van de Vyver found just the right melody and pace, so her teammates could write a song of success. Romania got Belgium a little bit out of tune with some bulletproof blocking, but then substitute setter Jasmien Biebauw entered the court and the tune changed to the Belgian’s favour again. Romania found themselves listening to sound of the green and yellow Mikasa hitting the floor on their side of the court over and over again as Belgium won the set 25-21.

The third set became a battle of rallies. Over and over again Romania and Belgium had to fight hard and long to make the score change on the screen in Crystal Hall in Baku. Romania took the lead from the start, but coach Guillermo Gallardo’s troops could not last pace, and Belgium won 25-23 with a lot of helps from the hands of Lise Van Hecke, who scored a massive 29 points today.

“We played a lot better today than we did against Italy in the first match where almost every possible thing went wrong. Today our organisation was much better. We took control of the easy situations and did not get stressed. I am happy with the win so we are still alive in the tournament,” says Lise Van Hecke from Belgium.

“We were a little bit tense, so we did not play very well at the beginning. We made a lot of easy mistakes; we tried, we came back a little but it was obviously too late. Now we need to find each other as a team and I hope that we will make better games from now on,” declared Romanian player Nneka Obiamaka Onyejekwe.

(sursa: cev.lu)