Good defence was one of the key factors for Czech Republic success
Okayama, Japan, May 31, 2015 - Japan took the comfortably lead 2-0 in the Sunday's clash courtesy of an excellent performance from Masashi Kuriyama nad Yuki Ishikawa on the attack. Czech Republic showed barely resistance allowing the hosts to earn points easily.
The third set saw already Japan's five point lead (14-9), but then the hosts lost their momentum. With big actions on defence and great attacks Czech Republic erased Japan's advantage and took the set 26-24.
Czech Republic showed much courage in the fourth set as they mounted well-timed blocks and unleashed strong attacks. Finally a strong spike from Jan Stokes, eventually the best scorer of the match with 26 points, sealed Czech Republic's win and called for a tie-break.
In the deciding set the emotions sky-rocketed. The beginning of this section was in favor of Japan that was up by 2 points (4-2). The Czechs responded very quickly levelling up the score 6-6 and eventually winnig the fifth set 15-11.
See the full match statistics, match text commentary and photo gallery
here.