At the outset of the hard-fought match, the Iranian squad comprised Javad Karimi, Rasoul Aghcheli, Amirhossein Esfandiar, Esmaeil Mosafer, Tayeb Eini, Aliasghar Mojarad and Esmaeil Talebi.
Given that both Iran and Argentina were looking forward to occupying the top position in their Pool, the Sunday evening debut turned to be a tough one.
At the end of the five-set thriller, Iran downed the Argentinian side 3-2.
The match remained completely competitive with a 25-21, 25-20, 23-25, 18-25 and 15-12 score although both sides had already secured spots in the last eight placements.
Iran closed the first set 25-21 thanks to solid reception and attacks of young Persian volleyball players. The second set came to an end at 25-20 in Iran’s favor again as Argentinians failed to defend attacks of Iranians.
The South American team returned to the game and won two successive sets over Iran.
The tie-break saw Iran progressing their game and staying on top of Pool D.
Behrouz Ataei, coach of Iran said “this match was beautiful, Argentina was a very good team, my players could not do everything we had planned but now I am very happy with this result. We earned this first place in our group and we are looking forward to the next stage.”
“We came here to win every match and so we did. It was a good game and a hard one at the same time. We followed the instructions from our coach and we made it,” said Rasoul Aghchehli, captain of Iran.
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