Sporting: Eagle Pinch Controversy Explained

Sporting went to visit CA Madalena and returned home with another 3-0 victory and the lead in the National Volleyball Championship, ahead of Benfica who did not let up in the chase although, yesterday, in the eighth round of this first phase they conceded a set (1-3) in Santo Tirso, against Ginásio who occupies the penultimate place in the classification.

And the game even seemed like another walk for the Reds, who came out in command, taking advantage of the strong and accurate service of Peter Wohlfahrtstatter and Murad Khan.

The Eagles reached 3-10 with ease and continued like that (10-19), closing the first half without difficulty (12-25).

Ginásio reacted and entered the second set better, even taking an advantage (7-5). Faced with the Reds’ dismay (10-7), Marcel Matz rallied the troops, but the speech took a long time to take effect (16-13). Nivaldo Gómez still managed to score two points when attacking the net and Tomás Natário, with another two, managed to get the Benfica fans to the minimum difference (23-22), however, Khan’s outside service was worth the second set (25-23) and the draw on the scoreboard (1-1).

Faced with the mistake, the Reds rolled up their sleeves and quickly reached 0-7 in the third half, dictating a trend that would not be so penalizing after Ginásio responded (8-11), benefiting from some errors in the defensive moment, however, Benfica kept the distance until 14-17 and a new time out by Marcel Matz ended up, this time, justifying the advantage with which the Red team made it 1-2 (19-25).

In the last set of the match, Benfica controlled, although not exuberantly until 7-11, however, from then on they dominated and closed the partial (14-25) and the match (1-3).

«I’m not going to hide anything, we have 14 players of very high quality who managed to adapt to playing without an opposite player. We achieved the victory, which was the most important thing», explained Marcel Matz, the winning coach.

«GC Santo Tirso played better in the 2nd set, achieved better results, having presented 60% [eficácia] in attack. It managed to have some spike in shares. In the other sets there was no doubt about our supremacy», defended Matz.

The Leonine coach, João Coelho, also praised his rivals, but was satisfied with the clear outcome. «The team entered with the seriousness that was required against a fierce, organized opponent, with a good first touch and good defensive play. We were serious, with good block action and we started the month of December on the right foot, which will have a lot of competitive density. We simplified our task», he assumed.

«Overall, we performed very well in all actions, we took the game very seriously, respecting the opponent, with the best results [0-3] and without penalty of physical overload for what lies ahead, as we have had a very high work density in recent weeks», he explained.

The day before, AA S. Mamede held third place in the standings, behind their Lisbon rivals but had to work hard to defeat Leixões 3-2 with scores of 25-23, 25-16, 12-25, 21-25 and 15-13.

AA Espinho went through the same hardship (3-2), at home to defeat Ala N’Alvares (20-25, 19-25, 25-20, 25-23 and 16-14), while Tigres defeated the Azoreans from Clube K by 3-1 (25-21, 25-23, 32-34 and 25-21).

In Maia, Castêlo was robbed by the Guimarães team who won 2-3.