Eurovolley Pool A: Greece down Romania, France destroy Bulgaria in straight sets!

After losing all three games at the start of EuroVolley, Greece have finally felt some joy as they downed Romania in four sets in Pool A in Montpellier (France). Greece are now closer to qualification. After a very tight match, Greece eventually prevailed, expecially thanks to outside-hitter Athanasios Protopsaltis and his 20 points. Romania put up a great fight but could not manage to close out sets 1 and 3, and fell quickly behind in set 4. Greece took a great performance today, towards grabbing the fourth qualifying ticket for the knock-out phase. However Portugal, and even Romania, can still take it. It will all be decided in the next two days with their two remaining matchups with Portugal.

Athanasios Protopsaltis – Greece’s outside hitter
“We put up a great fight as a team. We knew it would be tight, but we eventually won that one. It was a final for us, and we’ll have another final against Portugal tomorrow.”

France destroy Bulgaria in straight sets, thus assured to place at least second in Pool A. In front of a rich crowd, France continued to stage brilliant performances at the 2019 EuroVolley. The victory ensures France one of the first two places in the pool ahead of a derby against Italy on the last day of the Preliminary Round. This was Bulgaria’s first defeat in the tournament, while France have a perfect record (4-0) and remained the only team that did not concede a set. Julien Lyneel was the best on the winning side with 19 points (79% attack – 15/19). Kévin Le Roux added 4 aces, while Earvin Ngapeth played his first match at EuroVolley as an outside hitter (he debuted as libero, a few days ago). Tsvetan Sokolov scored 10 points for Bulgaria, while Svetoslav Gotsev set up 4 winning blocks. Recall that Pool A will cross Pool C, occurring in Ljubljana, where Russia, Slovenia, Finland, Turkey, Belarus, and North Macedonia are facing each other.

Stephen Boyer – France’s opposite:
“It was a bit hard to play three matches in a row, but we rested to be fully loaded for this particular game that was crucial for the ranking. I do not think they play at the level tonight but our victory was really efficient.”

2019 CEV European Volleyball Championhip, pool stage – Day 5:

POOL A (Montpellier, France)
Romania – Greece 1-3 (25:23, 24:26, 25:27, 21:25)
France – Bulgaria 3-0 (25:19, 25:21, 25:14)

POOL B (Brussels & Antwerp, Belgium)
Austria – Germany 0-3 (23:25, 15:25, 16:25)
Spain – Serbia 1-3 (25:21, 19:25, 19:25, 20:25)

POOL C (Ljubljana, Slovenia)
Russia – Finland 3-0 (25:17, 26:24, 25:22)
Belarus – North Macedonia 1-3 (25:23, 19:25, 27:29, 20:25)

POOL D (Rotterdam & Amsterdam, the Netherlands)
Montenegro – Ukraine 1-3 (25:19, 18:25, 15:25, 19:25)
Poland – Czech Republic 3-0 (25:18, 25:12, 25:15)

Source and photos: CEV