Australian Men Lose Their Round Matches at 2002 World Championships
The 2002Men's World Volleyball Championships began in Argentina on Saturday, September 28, withAustralia playing Argentina in front of 10,250 spectators.
After Argentina's good showing at the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games and in front ofa large home crowd, they went in to the match as clear favourites against theimproving Australians. The match ended up being one of the longest matchesat the Championships as Australia pushed Argentina all the way.
The Australian team's good blocking gave the team an early lead and withstrong hitting from Hidde (Shane) van Beest they took the first set, 25:22.Argentina made fewer errors in the second set with Milinkovic and Conteheading their attack. Hitting the lead for the first time in the match,Argentina finished the set strongly winning it 25:18. The third andfourth sets went down to the wire. Australia's setter, Matthew Young,spread the attack well across the net but in the end it was Argentina'sday, winning the sets 31:29 and 32:30, thereby taking the match 3-1.After the match, Australian head coach, Jon Uriarte, commented,"We had prepared [for] this match with a lot of dedication.We made that preparatory process along five months.I am very happy with the performance of the team."
Australia needed to win against Portugal on Monday, September 30,to keep their hopes of playing in the second round alive. A smallercrowd of 3,500 watched as the Australians lost their confidence andmade unforced errors against the Portuguese block. Australiacame back a little to win the up-and-down second set 27:25, butmistakes were the story of the day for the Australian side,eventually going down 1-3.
Australian captain, Dan Howard,summed up the match, saying, "It felt like the only time we weregenuinely fired up was towards the end of the second set when we came back.We were trying to get the intensity back but it just felt contrived. Itwas very stiff and nothing was flowing naturally. After playing so wellagainst Argentina, not being up to the standard is very disappointing."The loss put Australia out of the second round but still with one matchto play against China.
Good all-round team play gave China a 3-1 victory on Tuesday nightagainst Australia. The Asian side dominated the frist two sets25:19 and 25:20, but Australia fought back to win the third25:23. However it was all too late to save the Australiansas China closed out the match 25:21 in the fourth.It was a disappointing end to the Championship for theAustralian side which had been training together inpreparation for months. Jon Uriarte was looking forward tothe future after the match though, saying, "When I began my job,I knew it was a new chapter in Australian volleyball.I could keep players of the previous team and developthem to reach a higher level. Nowadays many of them are goingto play in Europe. I hope they continue growing and beingstronger so as to qualify for the Olympic Games".