Buoyed by its epic five-set comeback against Alas Pilipinas, Iran pulled off another thrilling rally to advance to the FIVB Volleyball Men’s World Championship quarterfinals.
Iran once again proved that no lead is safe, stunning Serbia with a come-from-behind 23-25, 25-19, 24-26, 25-22, 15-9 victory in the round of 16 on Tuesday night at the SM Mall of Asia Arena.
Head coach Roberto Piazza credited their previous dramatic comeback against Alas Pilipinas for preparing them for this moment.
“Imagine this—one of my players said to me during the game against the Philippines, ‘Coach, don’t be worried.’ And I said, ‘I’ve never in my life been worried. Never,’” said Piazza.
“It’s crucial to keep this momentum going. We are all happy, of course. That was an important game, but the most crucial one was against the Philippines. Maybe we trained perfectly for that because we ended up winning an amazing match. It was truly special. At one point, we had lost everything. And then, for one video challenge, one check… Now here we are, talking about the future. That was the turning point.”
Ali Hajipour and Morteza Sharifi spearheaded the rally with 23 points apiece to power Team Melli into the quarterfinals, where they will face Czechia on Thursday at 3:30 p.m.
Setter Arshia Behnezhad tallied 53 excellent sets, while Ali Haghparast chipped in 18 points and Mohammad Valizadeh added 10.
“What this shows is that we’re capable of playing all the way to the end. That’s important. And because of that, other teams will now try to stop us before the fifth set,” Piazza noted.
“Czechia is a strong team. They have experience. They’re really big and tall, with strong blockers. So we’ll need to be smart in our attack. For me, that will be the key to the game,” he added.
.png){kind=icon}