Men's volleyball makes great progress at Asian Cup

The Vietnam men's volleyball team has had positive performances to become the highest-ranked Southeast Asian team at the AVC Challenge Cup 2024.

After a quick 0-3 defeat to Australia in the opening match, the Vietnamese team played more cohesively to beat Taiwan (China) 3-0. This victory helped the Vietnamese boys enter the quarterfinals as second place in the group.

In the quarter-finals, the Vietnamese team fought bravely against strong opponents Pakistan. Despite being considered weaker, coach Tran Dinh Tien's students created a stalemate with their opponents and dragged the match into a decisive 5th set.

Here, the referee's controversial decision at a crucial moment cost the Vietnamese team the victory. When the score was 6-5 in favor of Vietnam, Nguyen Ngoc Thuan's smash hit the blocker and fell out of the court. The Pakistani team decided to exercise their right to appeal.

Video Challenge technology replayed a completely different situation and showed the ball on the field. The coaching staff and Vietnamese athletes tried to explain to the referee that the replay did not match reality but could not change the final decision.

This decision made the Vietnamese team lose their spirit and lose their composure at crucial moments. Coach Tran Dinh Tien's team regrettably missed out on a ticket to the semi-finals and had to play the 5th-8th place match.

In the qualifying match, Vietnam defeated host Bahrain 3-1, the runner-up team last season. The extraordinary ball distribution ability of setter Dinh Van Duy created extremely favorable conditions for the Vietnamese team's attackers, especially main attacker Nguyen Ngoc Thuan, to score. In addition, the excellent blocking ability of middle blockers Tran Duy Tuyen, Tran The Khai and Nguyen Thanh Hai discouraged the Bahraini players many times.

The Vietnamese team played confidently against the current runner-up Bahrain.

In the match for 5th-6th place against China, the Vietnamese team did not start well and let their opponents lead by 2 sets. It was not until set 3 that Tran Dinh Tien's students started to play better with the brilliance of Nguyen Ngoc Thuan and Pham Van Hiep. The Vietnamese team always maintained the lead and ended set 3 with a close score of 28-26.

In set 4, coach Tran Dinh Tien's team continued to play with determination, but the problem in the first step prevented us from launching a smooth attack like in set 3. The Chinese team exploited this weakness very well to win 25-21, thereby ending the match with a score of 3-1.

In the end, the Vietnamese team finished 6th at the AVC Challenge Cup, a much better result than strong teams in the region such as Indonesia, Thailand or Australia. The Vietnamese boys performed well and left many good impressions at this year's tournament.

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