Almaty, Kazakhstan, July 16, 2017 – Hosts Kazakhstan relished their first victory in the 2017 season of FIVB Volleyball World Grand Prix with 3-1 match (25-22, 22-25, 25-20, 25-15) against Croatia on Sunday at the Baluan Sholak Sports Palace.
Kazakhstan coach Vyacheslav Shapran: I promised that we will play better with each day and each game. We kept that promise and we won against a strong Croatia team. We played with all our best and we also want to thank the spectators who also helped us win this match. We have some players with injuries but today my players on the court showed that they could win and could rely on their own strengths.”
Kazakhstan captain Radmila Beresneva: I am very happy tonight because of this win against a very strong team. They are very young and very talented. I am one-hundred percent sure that next year they will be more powerful and it will be much harder to play against them. They can transform into a better team. It is a pity that we couldn’t win yesterday against Colombia. I am still thinking about this, that we could have won the match yesterday. But for now, I am satisfied with the victory today.
Croatia coach Miroslav Aksentijević: Congratulations to Kazakhstan. They played good volleyball and they deserved to win. I would also thank the Kazakhstan Volleyball Federation for the good conditions they provided for the teams. Unfortunately for our team, we did not play sufficiently in the best level we wanted. In some moments, we were able to play good volleyball, but we made mistakes. We knew it will be hard to play in this level but for sure we will improve our game.
Croatia captain Samanta Fabris: Thank you for everything because it was great being here. For sure we are disappointed because in these three days, we tried to show really good volleyball but it was not enough. I think when we start as a young team, at the beginning we should watch and observe every match to learn. We must also work hard. I think this team has a great potential and if we work hard, our future can be better.