Overwhelming cheers of more than 12,000 home fans did not stop even after China lost its men's volleyball opener 3-1 to the world No. 4 Bulgaria on Sunday.

Wing spiker Yuan Zhi scored a team high 24 points for China and veteran Vladimir Nikolov contributed 22 to Bulgaria.

"I'm satisfied with my players today, especially in the third set," said China head coach Zhou Jian'an. "The home advantage is also pressure for them, but I'm glad they took it well. We're confident to play better match by match."

It is the second Olympic show for China, ranked 21st in the world, the lowest among the 12 competitors. They appeared last time at the Los Angeles Games in 1984 as the replacement team.

The Chinese, who promised to "make fans satisfied", bowed twice to the fans after the 110 minute tussle. Disappointments could be found at the spectator stands.

"Yes, they (Chinese volleyballers) have tried, but they could be better without so many unforced errors. The most important of all, they should draw lessons from the loss," said Zhang Qin, a 22-year-old college student.

Both sides started strongly at the opener to tie 4-all, when China played solid defense to fend off Bulgarian heavy hitters and edged head ahead 7-4.

However, the high spikes of Bulgaria's young talent Matey Kaziyski and Nikolov broke China's unstable defense system and the Europeans take over the lead with a 6-1 run. The two sides had traded leads

until Bulgaria managed to keep a slight advantage 23-20 again with Kaziyski's high spike.

With two lethal spikes of Nikolov and Krasimir Gaydarski, they took the first set 25-20.

At the second set, Bulgaria's powerful serves proved to be deadly to the Chinese players as the latter could barely organize effective counterattacks with poor reception. The Bulgarians started 8-3 and led all the way to 25-21.

However, the host did not surrender easily. In the deafening yelling of "China, China", the Chinese managed to catch up with the stronger rivals from 5-6 to 19-19 with powerful spikes of Cui Jianjun and Yuan Zhi.

When Bulgaria led 24-23, an out-of-the-court block and then a spiking mistake made China lead 25-24 . After missing one set point, the Chinese grasped the set 28-26 thanks to a serve error by Nikolov and a high spike by Yuan.

The once Olympic champion Bulgaria gave no more chance to China in the finale and they took the set 25-19.

"We were nervous at the beginning and then we took control of the game. We made a lot of mistakes in the third set, but we won, that's important," said Bulgaria head coach Martin Stoev.

Bulgaria's captain Plamen Konstantinov missed Sunday's match due to injuries, said the coach, giving no more details.

"I was only informed of his injury this morning. The only thing I can tell you is the team's medical staff didn't allow him to take part in the match and I'm sure he won't play in the next," he said." But it doesn't mean he won't play the rest of the tournament."

Earlier in the day, defending champion Brazil breezed past Egypt in straight sets, Athens runner-up Italy upset Japan 3-1, Russia overcome Serbia also 3-1, while the United States, this year's World League champion clinched a hard win after a five-set tussle against Olympic newcomer Venezuela.

Twelve men's teams are divided into two groups to compete in the preliminary round of the Olympic volleyball tournaments that run through Aug. 10-18. The knockout stages are slated for Aug. 20 to 24.

China is grouped with the Athens runner-up Italy, the World Cup bronze medalist Bulgaria, the United States, ranked third, Japan and Venezuela. Defending champion Brazil, Russia, Serbia, Egypt, Poland and Germany are in Group B.

(Xinhua News Agency August 10, 2008)