Bulgaria captain Hristina Ruseva spikes against Canada
Sapporo, Japan, October 4, 2018 – Bulgaria had to fight hard to earn their place in the second round, edging Canada 3-1 (23-25, 27-25, 25-21, 25-21) on the last day of first-round action in the FIVB World Championship at Hokkaido Prefectural Sports Center on Thursday.
Bulgaria coach Ivan Petkov: Today was a good day for us and it was a good match. After this match we can go to the next round and this was our initial target. It was hard for our team after playing a very hard match against China yesterday. We lost then but when you win you are happy. Now we must think of our first match in the next round.
Bulgaria captain Hristina Ruseva: We kept our concentration from yesterday and I’m really happy we are able to get to the next round. We didn’t have any moments when we were down; we were really motivated to win today. We have a really young team but we played with a lot of heart on the court and today we gave everything.
Canada coach Marcello Abbondanza: For sure today we lost a big chance, especially on closing points. Losing our setter made a big difference. Without the setter, it’s hard to win. We have some young players and we made some wrong choices. I think we have to think about our performance because for sure I am not satisfied. I thought we would play difference volleyball but I’m sure these players can grow up and show what they can do.
Canada captain Kyla Richey: I don’t have much to say on the match but our goal for this World Championship was to advance to the second round and we’re extremely disappointed we didn’t do that. Yesterday and today were really important and we couldn’t finish and get to the second round, so we’re really disappointed.