China coach An Jiajie talks to his players during the match with Russia
Nagoya, Japan, September 9, 2017 – China coach An Jiajie was satisfied with his team’s play in their 3-0 win over Russia to remain unbeaten on the fourth day of the FIVB Volleyball Women’s World Grand Champions Cup at the Nippon Gaishi Hall on Saturday.
China coach An Jiajie: I’m happy with the win today. Russia are a very strong team, so we prepared well for this match. They played all-out volleyball and used some of their younger players. I thought we were flexible with our blocking and reception and also were aggressive with our serve. We still have some shortcomings but these are things we will sort out. In this competition, we play a different kind of team every day, so depending on the opposition we see different faults within our own game. We would like to be a more balanced team.
China captain Zhu Ting: Today, our blocking and reception were good and as an attacking player I did my best. There are still teams better than us out there and we want to learn from them and become a better team, and I want to learn from the many great players in China and become a better player myself.
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Latest VideosFacebookTwitterInstagramMedia GuidesRussia coach Vladimir Kuziutkin: As coach, I have been watching all the games, including those of China, and I am reminded that China is the best prepared team for this tournament. All the Chinese players have great talent and I was grateful today that they fielded a strong team. We used players who hadn’t played before and we fought hard.
The younger players got good experience from today’s game but they are not yet good enough to compete against a team like China. Following the Olympics last year, we are now preparing for the World Championship, but to win such a competition you must have experienced players and two or three young players. So, we’re trying to give our younger players experience so they can grow.
Russia captain Ekaterina Kosianenko: We got off to a good start in the match and as a team we were raring to go but unfortunately we couldn’t win. Today, we used players who hadn’t been able to play so far. The whole team were up for this challenge but the result was very disappointing. China is very well organised as a team. This is possible because of their good serve reception, which enables the setter to set up good attacks.