Fukuoka, Japan, October 4, 2019 – Gabriele Nelli scored a match-high 23 points as Italy rallied from a two-set deficit to score a 3-2 (26-28, 17-25, 25-12, 25-18, 15-10) victory over Argentina at the FIVB Volleyball Men’s World Cup on Friday.
Italy coach Gianlorenzo Blengini: "I’m really happy with the win because it came after two losses. These players have only played three matches together. In the first and second sets our serve was not good. We began to serve well in the third set. Argentina is a good team. They are the South American champions. With a better service we could read the match better.
"After the second set I told the team to hit the service away from the net and have more variation. They are a good team despite having many young players."
Italy captain Matteo Piano: "We are getting better every day. We kept our focus today. Tomorrow we have to focus on a strong opponent, that will be important. We respect our opponent but we have to be patient. We became confident in the third set. We have to always fight."
Argentina coach Marcelo Mendez: "There were a couple of different moments in the match. The first and second sets, and the third and fourth sets. They showed excellent blocking skills in the third and fourth sets. That is why we had this unfortunate result."
Argentina captain Martin Ramos: "We had good rhythm in the first and second sets. We lost it in the third and fourth sets and ended up losing. Our mentality was in disarray in the third and fourth sets. We made service mistakes.
"Their blocking was one of the factors, but we lost our concentration, which their blocks look better."
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