Russia - Italy (SET3)

Semi-final match of The Olympics 2004 between Russia and Italy. Team coached by Gianpaolo Montali won without loosing any set. That was the best performance of Italian team in that tournament. Their attack, defence and block were perfect. Nice match of Andrea Sartoretti who scored 20 points (46% in attack). The best scorer on the Russia side was Sergey Baranov with 12 points. Match was watched live at "Peace and Friendship Stadium" hall by 9000 fans. Luigi Masntrangelo, middle blocker of Italy national team said: "In this match, we came well prepared to neutralise the Russian team's attack. We were able to react even when they made substitutions. They are very tall players. We tried to have good serves". "Everything changed compared to our previous matches. I do not know why. Our weakest spot was the return of serve. Unfortunately, we did not give a real fight today and Italy managed to show good organisation." - on the press conference said coach of Russia NT: Gennady Shipulin.

#AndreaSartoretti #LuigiMastrangeloGigi #SergeyBaranov #PavelAbramov #Italy #Russia #TheOlympics2004