#France: Nice surprises Rennes, victory for Tourcoing and Sete in the advances of Round 1!

2 min read

11 October 2019 Danijel90

The three advances of the first Round of the French championship 2019/20 were played this evening. What happened? Nice surprises Rennes with a home victory at the tie break, while Tourcoing and Sete win in 4 sets respectively against Poitiers and Montpellier.
In detail, Nice made a great comeback in their first home game against Rennes. The guests, in the lead of two sets (20:25 and 24:26), were not able to close the game and have to settle for just one point in the standings, despite Rodrigues’s excellent debut, author of 30 points (including 5 aces and two winning blocks) and a good 52% in attack. Obviously he was the best scorer of the match, while Cox and Mehic were the top scorers on the winning side, with 23 points each.
Home victory also for Tourcoing, who needed four sets to win against Poitiers, also thanks to a good performance by Jimenez, one of the best scorers of last season (always with Tourcoing’s jersey), author of 21 points (43% in attack). Behind him Devid Fiel, author of 15 points including 4 winning blocks, and 65% in attack, while Neves and El Graoui did 24 and 20 points respectively for Poitiers.
The picture is closed by a beautiful and convincing victory by Sete on the Montpellier’s court. The team of the former coach of Nice, Kasic, took advantage of an excellent performance of his opposite Tupchii, undisputed top scorer of the match, author of 28 points (51% in attack), but also of Van De Velde, and his 8 winning blocks (14 in total for Sete, against the 7 for the home team). Sclater and Mendez were the only two Montpellier players to reach a double digit performance, 17 and 12 points respectively, but both with 43% in attack.
Tomorrow the other four games will be played, Cannes-Toulouse at 5 pm, while at 8 pm Paris will host Nantes, the big match between Chaumont and Tours will be played, in Ajaccio you will play on the Narbonne court.

Nice – Rennes 3-2