WITH its captain, Tine Urnaut, resting, Slovenia still made quick work of Chile, 25-19, 25-20, 25-16, for a winning start in the 2025 FIVB Volleyball Men’s World Championship on Saturday at the SM Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay City.
The Slovenians collected the full three points in Pool E to join Bulgaria as early leaders. They will clash on Monday at 5:30 p.m.
Nik Mujanovic embraced the opportunity to play the position of Urnaut, despite being a natural opposite hitter, delivering 13 points, including seven in the second set.
“It’s not easy to start a World Championship when you know that you have to win because there is a big difference between us and Chile if you look at the FIVB rankings but as I said to the players before the match, we have to play good volleyball to win this match,” said Slovenia head coach Fabio Soli.
His wards delivered what he asked of them as they dominated Chile in all scoring departments, 47-30 in attacks, 10-5 in blocks, and 5-1 in service aces.
Those gaps were more than enough to atone for the Slovenians’ 19 errors compared to the 13 of the Chileans, who made their return to the World Championship for the first time since their first appearance in 1982.
Slovenia is missing star hitter Rok Možič in these championships due to a knee injury.
“It's a very important win because it's the first one of this series, it's good to, like, get some momentum going before the other matches, you know,” said Mujanovic, who is just 20 years old.
“It’s really important not to get super comfortable, though I think because there are a lot of really, really good quality teams of experience, with a lot of great qualities by themselves and different elements of the game that we maybe are not as good at,” he added.
Tonček Štern spearheaded world no. 6 Slovenia with 15 points on 11 attacks, two blocks, and two aces, while recent VNL Best Middle Blocker Jan Kozamernik chimed in 11 points.
The Chileans, who will look to nail their first win against Germany on Monday as well at 1:30 p.m., relied on Vicente Parraguirre with 12 points and Noe Aravena with 11 points.
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