with videoThe Dutch volleyball players also won their third game at the World Cup in their own country. The Orange had to give up a set against Puerto Rico in Gelredome in Arnhem: 3-1. The set positions were 23-25 25-20 25-16 and 25-15. Previously, the Netherlands had won 3-0 against both Kenya and Cameroon.
Sports editor
28 Sep. 2022
Latest update:
28-09-22, 23:10
The Orange is therefore already certain of a place in the second round. The team of national coach Avital Selinger will face an opponent of a different level with Belgium on Friday, followed on Sunday by a duel with superpower Italy. All points from the first group stage will be carried over to the second round, which will be played in Rotterdam.
The Netherlands, which organizes the World Cup together with Poland, finished fourth at the World Cup four years ago. Reaching the quarter-finals is the first goal with a strongly rejuvenated team.
Selinger started with the same base as in the first two games. The team with Celeste Plak, Juliët Lohuis, Anne Buijs, Britt Bongaerts, Nika Daalderop, Eline Timmerman and Libero Myrthe Schoot started energetically, but halfway through it was equal again (13-13). In the final phase, things still went wrong for the Orange, who led 23-21, but then had to concede 4 runs in a row; especially by Puerto Rico’s star Abercrombie Brittany.
Buijs, top scorer in the first two matches, started halfway through the second set. The Orange took the second set at 24-20 from a service from Daalderop. Both attackers continued their upward trend in the third and fourth set. The Netherlands did not get into trouble anymore and will sometimes think back to the first, sloppy set. Buijs, Daalderop and Lohuis each scored 16 points.
For the last two matches in the group, the organization has found room to expand the capacity of the main field in Gelredome to about 10,000 seats. For the second round, the Orange squad moves to Ahoy in Rotterdam. Poland houses the other group in that phase. The quarterfinals are also divided between both countries, with Apeldoorn as the playing city in the Netherlands. The final will also be held in Omnisport on October 15 in that city.
Captain Buijs spoke of a team performance after a difficult start. “Maybe it’s good that you get that resistance. It shouldn’t all be too easy before you hit the really good teams. It is of course a bit of ‘shaking’ such an end of the first set and the beginning of the second. But we picked it up well.”
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