France players celebrate during the awarding ceremony
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, July 19, 2015 – France celebrated their first FIVB Volleyball World League title, while Serbia had to settle for a third silver medal after a 3-0 victory at the Maracanazinho Arena on Sunday.
Laurent Tillie, coach, France: “To be the World League champion is a great feeling because it was a long run. We started three months ago and we played many matches with tough teams. We succeeded because we stayed focused on each point. We were concentrated enough to take our chances. That is why we won today.”
Benjamin Toniutti, captain, France: “We arrived here with less pressure than the other teams, because we were in Group 2, but we knew that we could win. We won in Brazil in 2013 and we knew that we could do it again. I do not know how to explain the way we feel, but I think that we won't think about this for now, maybe tomorrow. But we are very happy, we trained so hard for two and a half months and now we go back now with this trophy for France. Words cannot describe this.”
Nikola Grbic, coach, Serbia: “I salute France, losing is part of sport. Today we did not play as we did in the other matches. Our team did not play as sharp as we could. However, the bottom line is that we had a great season. I am very happy with our performance in this competition.”
Aleksandar Atanasijevic, player, Serbia: “We did not play very well today. Our team was not as aggressive as yesterday, but we can take lessons with this second place. Our team is young, we will rest one month and we will come back for training and looking for gold. We will focus on getting a spot in Rio 2016 (Olympic Games). It is a hard qualification process, but we believe in ourselves.”