The Polish national team beat Italy in the match for third place this year in the League of Nations. The match was not easy, but the Polish team managed to win a bronze medal.
After Poland lost to the USA in the semi-finals of the League of Nations, the only thing left for the Polish team was to fight for the bronze medal in this competition. Our compatriots were opposed by the hosts of the playoffs, the Italians, who turned out to be weaker than the French.
Match for 3rd place in the League of Nations. Spectacular game of the Poles in the first set
Already at the beginning of the first set, the Poles had a little trouble, but they responded well to them, winning back two points due to a strong attack by Kurek or an ace on Benek’s serve. Semenyuk also confirmed his good form, scoring points in attack even from the most difficult balls. It could be seen with the naked eye that Nikola Grbic’s wards started this meeting with a completely different, greater energy than before the semi-finals.
In the first game, a very long action turned out to be decisive, in which both teams defended desperately and heroically at the same time. However, in the end, Mikieletto was blocked, and the score was 15:10 in favor of Poland. We just increased that lead until we won the set to 16.
The match between Poland and Italy developed in accordance with the wishes of the white-reds. We made up for the loss
Unfortunately, at the beginning of the second set, the Byalo-Chervonykh game broke down and after a few minutes the score was 2:6. This is the result of Bienek’s mistake in the middle or Kurek’s two shots in cars. At this stage, Italy has scored more points thanks to us than thanks to their players. Luckily, however, our team members were able to get up again in a difficult situation, and on the service of the Polish captain we drew 11:11.
There was no shortage of emotions in this phase of the match, especially since we saw a lot of controversial situations that had to be resolved by replays and challenges. The duel turned out to be very equal, and Grbic’s players, unfortunately, did not avoid simple mistakes. What’s disappointing is the loss of a point after Janusz’s bad pass at the end of the set. Later, however, Bjenik shone in the slimes, and it was largely thanks to him that we won to 23.
The third set of the match Poland-Italy for Byalo-Chervony. We won the bronze medal of the League of Nations
Neither team nor the other team gave up in the third set. The best evidence of this was the action, which lasted a full 39 seconds - such long exchanges are really rare in volleyball. It’s a pity that the Italians scored a point in the end thanks to Romano’s shot after our block.
Interestingly, it turned out that this situation only drove the White-Reds. Right after it, we had three “eyes” in the score, because Semenyuk scored on the court, Lavia made a mistake, and then Benek sent an ace. Fornal also had good changes. At the end of the third set, Italy were unable to cope with the previously mentioned acquisition of Perugia. Semeniuk ended his excellent performance with a killer performance and after a while we were able to enjoy winning the 2022 Nations League bronze medal.
Source: Wprost
