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Russia Wins Women’s Volleyball Gold
// A foreign coach wins the world championship for the Russian team
Russia won the women’s world volleyball championship with a 3-2 victory over favorite Brazil, which has been unbeatable for 18 months, on Thursday. Italy’s Giovanni Caprara has become the first foreign coach to win a world championship for Russia.
The appointment of Italian-born Giovanni Caprara was once viewed as a controversial step. What is more, not long before the championship he said he felt some distrust of a number of Russian sports officials and even promised to resign in case of the team’s failure in the championship’s semi-finals.
Caprara headed the women’s team replacing Nikolay Karpol, the legendary coach known for his strict if not authoritarian style of coaching. It was with him that the national team won its last gold world medal – in 1990. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the women’s team did not win a world or Olympic gold, though it played steadily fetching silvers and bronzes.
Giovanni Caprara has had only Italian volleyball titles to his name. He came to Moscow without any Russian and had to speak to the players through his wife, a famous Soviet volleyball player Irina Kirillova. Caprara wanted to make a fresh start. He boosted the team with up and coming Marina Akulova and Svetlana Kryuchkova but kept the team’s three key players – Lyubov Sokolova, Ekaterina Gamova and Elena Godina.
Less than one week after its loss to Brazil in the group stages at the championship in Osaka, the Russians rose to turn the tables to win 15-25, 25-23, 25-18, 20-25, 15-13.
The Russians had a slow start but managed to found their rhythm in the second set. They dropped the fourth set but came back to win the tie-break.
Shashkova formed an impenetrable wall along with two team-mates, Ekaterina Gamova and Elena Godina, which eventually eclipsed the powerful and previously unbeaten Brazilians.
Just a few points made the difference in the decider. Russia was losing 13-11, and all hopes seemed lost. Giovanni Caprara had to take a time-out. The Brazilians, however, made the same mistake again. They lost to Russia yesterday just as they lost their previous match – to Russia again – at the Olympics in Athens, letting all match balls slip. The same thing happened in Osaka on Thursday. Yulia Merkulova blocked Brazil’s player and let Ekaterina Gamova score the match winner.
Two seconds after, everyone was in tears – the Brazilians and the Russians. A few minutes later, Giovanni Caprara received congratulations from the Russian Volleyball Association and the FSB head Nikolay Patrushev and started signing the Russian anthem.
This victory will definitely make it hard to criticize the once-risky decision to hire a foreigner.
Alexey Dospekhov
All the Article in Russian as of Nov. 17, 2006
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