Lusofonia Games 2014: Indian women's volleyball team beat Macau

Lusofonia Games 2014

Indian women’s volleyball defeated Macau in straight sets at Dr Shamaprasad Mukherjee stadium, as they started their Lusofonia games campaign on a winning note.

Melinda Pereira led the Indian team which defeated Macau 25-16, 25-10 and 25-10, and they will now face Mozambique today. Macau, led by Lei Sin Kuan were second best throughout the match.

“The attack was okay from our side but we had a locking failure,” said Kuan after the match in the presence of team’s chief coach NG Wai Keong.

She further blamed the defeat on the team’s weak defence.

The Indian captain felt that India’s international exposure had helped them usurp their rivals yesterday.

“Girls performed very good, the attack was good, defence was good and we had good lock time,” she said.

R P Tailor, coach of the Indian team has credited the victory on Tiji Raju an dVegandan Soumya, thetwo most promising players.

“Our priority is to concentrate on the next match now,” he said.

India were attacking right from the start and except for few minutes during the second half, were the better team and were hitting thier best shots over the net, as they outshone their Macau counterparts.

Indian lefter Priyanka Khedkar had few of the best saves during the first set, while Vengadan Soumya also shot some of the faboulous serves, while also displaying the best defence.

Kuan’s efforts to score met with limited success. Pereira who did not play the first set, joined from the second set as India looked to build from their impressive performance in the first set winning by 25-16.

Macau made three substitutions during the second set, but eventually lost 10-25, while India wrapped up the game only in the third out of five sets, winning the third one 25-10.