Al-Arabi to enter final of Asian men's club volleyball championship
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Qatar's Al-Arabi marched into the final of the 2010 Asian men's club volleyball championship after beating Shanghai of China 3-1 here on Saturday.
"Al-Arabi is a strong rival, their serving is too strong for us," said Wang Jian, head coach of Shanghai. "We didn't have such powerful serves in domestic matches. We tried to stop their serves, but obviously, we didn't do it well."
Al-Arabi went into the game quickly and after an ace by Christian Pample, the Qatari team reached the first technical timeout with 8-4 ahead.
Chinese Fang Yingchao popped up on the left to strike home and joined middle blocker Cui Xiaodong to block, helping the team pull level at 11-11.
However, Al-Arabi gained the upper hand to score four points in a row to lead 15-11 and never looked back. As Hidalgo Salvador picked off a deciding point from right of the net, Al-Arabi sealed the set at 25-22.
The blocking and spiking of Fang and Wang Qingfei enabled Shanghai to make a solid start to the second set, earning an early lead at 6-0. The powerful serve from Al-Arabi was totally silenced as they made too many unforced errors. Fang finished the set at 25-15 with a brisk winner.
"They made many mistakes at serving at the second set, which gave us chances to organize quick attacks," said Wang, "However, when they rebuilt their serving power, we still can not find attacking rhythm."
Shanghai had difficulty finding their range as they dropped four points in the third set due to poor blocking and receiving. Spotlight came to Christian Pample of Al-Arabi as he often climbed well from left and destroyed two-strong defence of Shanghai to kept the points coming for China, who reached the second technical timeout 16-12.
Al-Arabi then boosted their blocking and Salvador moved his team six points ahead and Pample spiked home from right to help Al-Arabi take the set 25-19.
After Al-Arabi storming to an unbeatable 8-0 run at the fourth set, the defense of Shanghai fell to pieces as the Qatari men were on fire. Al-Arabi took the set and the whole match at 25-12 after a serve from Shanghai's Li Chunhui flied far out of the court.
"There are four players who didn't come with the team and our libero is a newcomer who played volleyball for not a long time. If we have all players here, I think the result will be different," said Wang.
Defending champion Iran's Paykan will clash with Panasonic Panthers from Japan in the other semifinal on Saturday.
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