Challenger Cup. Women. 1/4 finals
July 27. Laval, France
Ukraine — Croatia 3-1 (25:15, 25:15, 18:25, 25:19)
Starting line-up of the national team of Ukraine: Sharhorodska (2), Dorsman (k) (7), Maievska (8), Milenko (17), Dymar (13), Kraiduba (19), Niemtseva (l). Substitutes: Kodola (1).
The women's national team of Ukraine confidently defeated Croatia and won a ticket to the semifinals of the Challenger Cup. At this stage of the competition, the blue-yellow team will play against France on July 29, which for its part was stronger than Vietnam (3-0).
Ivan Petkov did not experiment with the starting line-up, releasing proven fighters to the court. The teams had an equal start to the confrontation with certain game differences - 5:6, 7:6. Towards the middle of the set, the initiative was completely taken over by the Ukrainians: effective attacks by Anastasiia Kraiduba, Oleksandra Milenko and Yuliia Dymar contributed to this - 11:9.
Soon, the powerful shot of the same Kraiduba forced the coach of Croatia, Ferhat Akbash, to take a timeout - 14:10. Next, our block went into action, which was almost impossible for the opponents to break through at that time. Hence such a big gap between the teams in the debut set — 25:15.
One of the best attackers of the Croatian national team, Andrea Mihaljevic (she scored 12 points in total), opened the scoring in the next set. This moment added momentum to her team - 6:8. It was also noticeable that the Ukrainians began to make more mistakes on serves - 10:14.
However, our volleyball players came to their senses in time and minimized their mistakes. So, on the serve of Daria Sharhorodska, who knocked out the opponents from the reception, they organized an incredible rush and finally turned the tide of the match - 20:14. As a matter of fact, Petkov's wards brought the set to their victory - 25:15.
In the third set, the teams kept pace for a long time. Two consecutive aces by Laura Milos made the blue and yellow nervous - 14:17. It gave the impression that the Croatians have only just found their game both in attack and defense. For their part, the national team of Ukraine was not ready for this - 18:25.
Our players entered the fourth set full of energy - 3:0, 6:3. It was them who dictated their terms on the court to their opponents in those moments. The latter continued to impose a fight, and soon with organized actions over the net they leveled the parity - 7:7.
Svitlana Dorsman almost immediately responded with "kindness", by "covering" Bojana Butigan. We did not manage to immediately return the previous advantage - 15:15. But after some time, a spectacular attack with the first pace of Anastasiia Maievska put everything in its place - 18:15. The Croatians probably didn't have enough strength for a comeback - 25:19.
By the way, the best scorer of the meeting was Anastasiia Kraiduba. The opposite has 19 points.
