Confident China pulled off a huge shock to down strong Poland 3-1 at the 2008 Volleyball World League preliminaries in Hangzhou, east China's Zhengjiang Province on Saturday.
China beat their European opponents, runners-up of 2006 World Championship, 26-24, 25-21, 22-25, and 25-18 with quick attack and sound defense in the cheer of more than 4,000 home fans, ranking the top of Pool D.
In another match of Pool D on Saturday, Egypt upset Japan 3-1 to take the second place of the pool.
Chinese side attacker Yuan Zhi, who said himself was at the peak of his career, became the most shining star of the match by contributed the team 25 points.
China lost their two home games in the 2007 World League against Poland. The two teams both kept a 1-1 win-loss record against Japan and Egypt respectively at the first round preliminaries last weekend.
Raul L. Lozano, head coach of Poland denied that the absence of three key players, namely, star center Pawel Zagumny, Michal Winiarski and Sebastian Swiderski, who stayed in Poland to prepare the upcoming Beijing Olympic Games, affected the teamwork.
"This is only the half way to Beijing and we have to save some power for the Games," said the Argentine."But China made fewer mistakes than us in service, attack and receiving today and that's why they win the game."
China started brightly and took an early lead 8-4 with fast attack and unyielding defense in the opening set, but Poland soon leveled the match at 9-9 with the spikes of the Polish captain Gruszka Piotr.
The game was then brought to a stalemate, when the Polish team's receiving and serving mistakes help China break a 16-all tie and take the lead 21-18.
The Chinese spikers managed to keep their winning momentum to 24-22 and took the opener 26-24 after missing two set points.
With one set point in hand, Chinese became more confident at the net and the fierce spikes of Yuan Zhi and Yu Dawei stemmed the Pole's intention to bounce back. With a crosscourt spike of Yu, China took the set 25-21.
The Pole fought back strongly to win the third set 25-22, but the Chinese did not give them more chance in the fourth set. With the powerful serving of veteran player Shi Hairong and revival of Captain Shen Qiong, China sealed the victory 25-18.
"I'm very satisfied that my players have shown strong desire to win the game and they made it," said Zhou Jian'an, China's head coach. "We cherish the chance to play with strong teams like Poland, which help to polish our skills and build our confidence."
The two teams will play another game on Sunday afternoon also at the Yellow Dragon Stadium in Hangzhou, provincial capital of east China's Zhejiang Province.
"We will show that we are a better team tomorrow," said Polish player Kadziewicz Lukasz.
Sixteen teams in the World League compete in four pools. Brazil, France, Serbia, Venezuela are in Pool A, while Russia, Cuba, Republic of Korea, Italy are in Pool B. The United States, Bulgaria, Spain and Finland meet in Pool C, while Poland, Japan, China and Egypt compete in Pool D.
In the end, six teams will compete in the final round in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil from July 23 to 27.
(Xinhua News Agency June 22, 2008)