Matosinhos, Portugal, July 9, 2016 – Portugal have beaten the Netherlands in a spectacular semi-final clash on Saturday night. In front of 4,800 thrilled spectators at Centro de Desportos e Congressos in Matosinhos, hosts Portugal overpowered the Netherlands 3-1 (25-22, 26-24, 17-25, 29-27) to claim the second ticket for Sunday’s final clash of FIVB World League Group 2. Read here what the coaches and captains said after the match.
Portugal coach Francisco Santos: It was a suffered win, yes, but this are the type of matches that makes a team grow. This match was excellent to reach our goal, which is to prepare the team to fight for the 2020 Olympic Games spot.
Canada is a very strong team, has several solutions and therefore they've resting some players, thinking ahead of Rio 2016 but we know that they want the promotion to Group 1. We will be playing without inferiority, as we want to win too and thank all the people that believe in our work.
Portugal captain Alexandre Ferreira: It was a good game from our side. We were consistent and they ended by having more errors than we had. We took some risk at the key moments and we were rewarded.
The Netherlands coach Gido Vermeulen: We started badly and we lost the first two sets. Then we reacted and got back our playing style. Some poor decisions in key moments prevented us from reaching our goals, but the truth is that we did not performed at our best tonight. Now, we will rest and prepare the match against Turkey for the bronze medal.
The Netherlands captain Jasper Diefenbach: We had good opportunities throughout the match and we are disappointed by the loss. Congratulations to Portugal for the match as they deserved it. Tomorrow will be another match. Let us rest and study our next opponent and fight for the win, as that is our way of playing the game.