China, Russia Winners at Grand Prix Final

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, August 02, 2002

China, Russia Winners at Grand Prix Final

The hosts China and Sydney Olympic silver medallists Russia were winners on the opening day of the 2002 women's volleyball World Grand Prix Final Thursday in Hong Kong.

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The hosts China and Sydney Olympic silver medallists Russia were winners on the opening day of the 2002 women's volleyball World Grand Prix Final Thursday in Hong Kong.

China sailed past the newly formed Brazilian team 25-21, 25-18,18-25, 25-19 and Russia trounced Germany 25-19, 25-15, 25-22.

"Generally speaking, we played to our standard today," said Chinese head coach Chen Zhonghe. "But we had up and downs in the match."

"We did not do very well in receiving and blocking and I think our blocking was the worst in recent matches," he added.

The Chinese women, who won eight of nine matches and finished first over Russia in the preliminaries, rallied from a 0-5 deficitto take the first set 25-21.

Brazil, three-time titlist at the Grand Prix Final, dropped seven of the final nine points to surrender the second set before coming back with a 25-18 victory in the third.

In the fourth set, China led most of the way and Zhao Ruirui sealed the victory for them with a well-placed spike.

"It was a very good match," said Brazilian captain Welissa Gonzaga. "The Chinese played very fast so we had difficulty in blocking and made a lot of mistakes, especially in attacking."

Zhao led the Chinese attack with 19 points, 14 of which came from spiking.

The Russian women, hot favorites to win the title and the 200,000 U.S. dollars prize money, had no great trouble in the straight-sets win over Germany but Russia head coach Nikolai Karpol asked more from his players.

"We won the match but we did not performed to our best," said Karpol after the 59-minute match. "Because we got very tired afterthree weeks of preliminaries."

"But I think we will be in our top form when we meet China tomorrow," he added.

The Germans ousted Olympic and world title-holders Cuba and defending champions the United States for a Final berth, but Russia's explosive spiking and relentless blocking proved too muchfor them.

"Their service and blocking were very good," said Germany's South Korean coach Lee Hee Wan. "We will try to play much better tomorrow."

The Germans are to play Brazil on Friday while China will take on Russia. Top two finishers from the four-team round-robin competitions will vie for the title on Sunday with the other two fighting for the bronze medal.

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