Luck was no longer with the young team of coach Tran Dinh Tien when the Vietnamese men's volleyball team faced Thailand in the first semi-final match of the AVC Challenge Cup at noon on July 14.
It seemed that not having to face the 32nd SEA Games champion Indonesia in the semi-finals would open up an opportunity for the Vietnamese team to write a new page in the history of domestic volleyball, but it was meeting the "nemesis" Thailand that shattered the continental dream of Tu Thanh Thuan and his teammates...
Vietnam team leads 25-20 in the first game
Having had one more day off than their opponents, and having witnessed Thailand being "exhausted" to the extreme in the quarter-final match against Indonesia just 24 hours earlier, the Vietnamese team quickly materialized their advantage by taking a 25-20 lead in the first set. Instead of taking advantage of the excitement created to accelerate, the Vietnamese team gave their opponents a chance to equalize.
Thanh Thuan in the scoring attack for the Vietnam team
The first pass still had too many problems, the second line defense was loose while the blockers worked ineffectively, the Vietnamese team lost the next two games in a row with scores of 13-25 and 22-25. Hope was rekindled in the fourth game when the Vietnamese team continuously led 5-3 and then 8-5 without creating too much of a gap.
Thailand reverses to reach the final
A successful challenge at 9-9 helped Thailand take the lead and the Golden Temple team went straight to the finish line when closing the fourth game with a score of 25-15, winning the final 3-1 in the first semi-final. The ticket to the final of the AVC Challenge Cup 2023 also belonged to the Thai team while the Vietnamese players watched in amazement as everything slipped away from their grasp.
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