The Berlin Volleys remain undefeated in the Volleyball Champions League this season.
On the last day of the group stage, the German champions won 3:2 (21:25, 25:21, 21:25, 28:26, 17:15) at Zenit St. Petersburg on Thursday after another impressive performance. 24 hours earlier, the Berliners had also won the first game against the fourth-placed team in the Russian Superliga 3-2 in the same place.
However, the result of the second encounter between the two teams no longer had any influence on the final positions in the table. It was already clear beforehand that the Berliners would go into the quarter-finals first and St. Petersburg second. The draw for the knockout stage will take place on Friday at the European Volleyball Federation (CEV) in Luxembourg.
After the strenuous five-set thriller from the day before, in which the Bundesliga leaders had turned around from a 0:2 set deficit, the team again put in a committed performance. After winning the second set, the guests were also on course in the third round. Nehemiah Mote, Tim Carle and Benjamin Patch made up a 14-17 deficit. A little later, the Berliners took the lead for the first time (20:19) thanks to an ace by Patch, but then lost their concentration for a short time, which resulted in a 1:6 point series and the loss of the set.
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The volleys remained nerve-racking. In the fourth round they fended off three match points from the Russians. Through Carle they took the lead at 27:26, with an ace from Patch they also ended the game.
In the tie-break, neither team could pull away. St. Petersburg got the first match point, but an ace by Sergej Grankin at 15:14 turned the tide. The volleys were finally able to use the third match point.