Bahrain go down fighting to India in Asian volleyball

TDT | Manama                                                                         

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Bahrain went down fighting to India while defending champions Iran cruised past Saudi Arabia to punch their tickets to the semi-finals this evening in the 21st Asian Men’s U20 Volleyball Championship, currently being hosted by Bahrain at Isa Sports City in Riffa.

The Bahrainis succumbed to their Indian counterparts 1-3 (22-25, 19-25, 28-26, 24-26) in a tightly contested affair, while Iran ousted West Asian champions Saudi 3-0 (25-20, 25-15, 25-21).

The hosts are now out of title contention and will play for their best classification. India march through to the final four where they await their opponents.

As per the tournament format implemented by the Asian Volleyball Confederation, Bahrain as hosts and Iran as defending champions, along with their opponents, gained a bye from the round-of-12 playoffs and advanced directly to the quarter-finals, following the preliminaries.

The other teams need to win their playoff ties to make it to the quarters. Among those others to triumph yesterday and advance to the round of eight were South Korea, Bangladesh, Thailand and China.

South Korea shrugged off a slow start in their game to beat Pakistan 3-1 (23-25, 25-21, 25- 23, 25-20), while Bangladesh recovered from an opening-set setback to defeat Qatar 3-2 (20- 25, 25-19, 25-18, 23-25, 15-9) in a nail-biter.

Thailand were also stretched to the maximum by Iraq in a 3-2 (25-21, 25-17, 23-25, 19-25, 15-12) battle, while China were fully dominant against the UAE 3-0 (25-20, 25-14, 25-7). South Korea now play Bangladesh in the quarter-finals, while Thailand clash with China.

Both of those contests are scheduled for today, along with other classification games. All are welcome to attend. Entrance is free of charge. In Bahrain’s loss, the nationals were unable to find their groove early on and India took full advantage, going up by two sets.

But spurred by the large crowd of home fans, the Bahrainis fought back and stayed alive in the match by taking set three, then in the fourth almost pulled off an impressive comeback to force a tie-break, but the Indians came up with the crucial points in the end.

India head coach G E Sridharan commented after the game: “It was a fantastic match. I did not expect that Bahrain would play the way they did. They were extraordinary, but my boys also put up a good fight. We won the match but still need to do more in the semi-finals.”

Harshir Giri and Tanish Chaudhary scored 14 points apiece to lead India in their win. Sameer Chaudhary added 10. Sayed Hashem had a valiant 20 points for Bahrain. Hasan Warqaa and Ali Alarab chipped in with nine each.

With the loss, Bahrain are back in action in the classification round tomorrow. India’s semi-final opponents will be either Thailand or China. In Iran’s comfortable victory, Amir Mohammad Golzadeh was their top scorer with 17 points.

For Saudi, Jawad Alkhawaher had 15 markers. Like India, the Iranians now await their opponents in the final four and have a rest day today. They will play either South Korea or Bangladesh tomorrow. The South Koreans maintained their unbeaten run in the tournament, shrugging off a poor start in their come-from-behind, four-set victory over Pakistan.

They were spearheaded by the 24 points of team captain Yunsoo Lee. South Korea head coach Kang Sooyoung said after their win: “Pakistan is such a great team, but we prepared for them, especially the blocking, which wasn’t as good as our other matches.

“The games are getting tougher now. We need to be ready.” Tournament debutants Bangladesh continued their remarkable run with their five-set triumph against Qatar. They now face an even tougher test against the mighty South Koreans, who are among the favourites in the competition.

Sadi Mohammod Shafin was the leading scorer for the Bangladeshis, finishing with 15 points. Team captain Tanveer Hossain Tonmoy was delighted with their result, and he thanked the Kingdom’s Bangladeshi community for turning up and supporting their squad.

“Their support gave us energy,” Tonmoy said. “Sometimes in the match, we feel down, but their support really gave us a boost.” Thailand had an impressive start in their game against Iraq and quickly took a two-set advantage, but their rivals crawled their way back to force the tie break.

There, the Thais were able to dig deep into their arsenal and close out the win. Kittipong Sangsak finished as their leading scorer with 24 points, which was matched by Iraq’s Hasan Taha in the loss. Thailand now set up a meeting with China for the right to march through to the final four, as the Chinese ousted the UAE in a lopsided win. Zhou Xin was the top performer for China with 15 points.

Meanwhile, Australia defeated Kuwait 3-1 (23-25, 25-23, 25-14, 25-18) in their 13th-to-17th classification game, which was also played yesterday. William D’Arcy-Miles scored a game-high 27 points to spearhead the victors.

The Australians now face off with Japan in their next match of this classification stage, while Hong Kong and Chinese-Taipei battle in another fixture. The winners of those two games will compete for 13th place overall, while the losers will contest for 15th. Following their loss, the Kuwaitis finished 17th overall in the tournament.