Chinese men's volleyballers celebrated the first win at Olympics in 24 years after outgun Venezuela on Tuesday, while defending champion Brazil remain undefeated after 3-1 win over Serbia.
It is the second Olympic show for China, ranked 21st in the world, the lowest among the 12 competitors. They appeared last time at the Los Angeles Games in 1984 as the replacement team and finished an dismal 8th.
The long-waited victory cover a five-set tussle with Venezuela, laying a solid foundation for the host to realize its goal of "entering the final eight" after losing the opening match 1-3 to strong Bulgaria.
China came back from two sets down to end the two-hour toil. Captain Shen Qiong contributed the team with 17 points, while Ernardo Gomez led the Venezuelan scorers with 27 points.
"We knew it would be a tough match and it was. Persistence and patience helped us to stick to the end," said China's head coach Zhou Jian'an. "I asked the player to calm down after the third set collapse and they did."
Despite the absence of its top scorer Gilberto Godoy Filho due to shoulder injury, Defending Olympic champions Brazil overcame a sluggish start to beat the new World's League runner-up Serbia 3-1 for their second straight win.
Murilo Endres and Dante Amaral each notched 18 points to lead the world No. 1 to the 25-27, 25-20, 25-17 and 25-21 victory while dropping the Europeans to an 0-2 win-loss record in pool B.
"We did well in blocking, defense and reception, especially in reception, I hope we can play better in the next game against Poland," said Brazil head coach Bernardo Rezende.
The Serbians suffered another blow as its key player Bojan Janic had his ankle injured and may be absent from next match against Poland, which is critical for Serbian to enter the quaterfinals.
Athens bronze medalist Russia is luckier as it narrowly escaped from a major upset after overcoming lowly-ranked Germany in five sets.
Rallied twice from one set down, the world No. 2 closed the tiebreaker to land the 25-27, 25-21, 21-25, 25-23 and 16-14 victory over the World No. 17 and improve to 2-0 in preliminary pool B.
Germany, who had lost to Poland in straight sets on Sunday, overcame an early 5-1 deficit in the tiebreaker to overtake the lead at 11-8, but failed to hold on.
"There are many factors that can decide the result of the match, luck is one of them," Russian head coach Vladimir Alekno told Xinhua."Of course the victory is good for us, but I am more happier with the fact that we kind of surpassed ourselves."
The favorite United States also grasped a second hard win, coming back from one set down to outgun Athens silver winner Italy 24-26, 25-22, 25-15 and 25-21 after the two-hour toil.
Strong serving and effective blocking were proved to be the key to success of the Americans, who survived from a five-set thriller against Venezuela.
The American head coach Hugh McCutcheon still did not show up at the team's second match either after his family members were stabbed in Beijing on Saturday, but the players performed unaffected.
"We played strong serving today, which caused many problems for Italy on receiving and that help us to present good blocking," said Ronald Larsen, the US assistant coach.
In another two matches of the day, Poland swept away Egypt in straight sets and Bulgaria, who beat host China 3-1, toppled the other Asian force Japan 3-1 to remain unbeatable.
Twelve teams are competing in two groups in the preliminary round with top four finishers from each group to qualify for the quarter-finals.
China is grouped with Italy, the World Cup bronze medalist Bulgaria, the US, Japan and Venezuela and defending champion Brazil, Russia, Serbia, Egypt, Poland and German are in Group B. The knockout stages run from Aug. 20 to 24.
(Xinhua News Agency August 13, 2008)