Costa Rica beats Nicaragua in five intense sets

GUATEMALA CITY, Guatemala, October 6, 2014. - Costa Rica had to extend their first victory at the Women’s XVIII Central American Cup to a tie break of (21-25, 25-22, 21-25, 25-18, 15-8) over Nicaragua at Teodoro Palacios Flores Gymnasium in Guatemala City.

Defending champion Costa Rica fought back strongly against Nicaragua who controlled the actions from the beginning. It was in the third set when the intensity of the match reached its peak as Nicaragua held a nine point advantage as Costa Rica struggled to recover confidence and turn the score in their favor with powerful kills in the last two sets.

Costa Rica dominated in kills by 50-42 and in blocks by 14-7. In serves, Nicaragua held only a one point advantage of 5-4. Costa Rica committed the most unforced errors, with 44 in total while Nicaragua concluded with 39.

Costa Rica’s captain Angela Willis scored a match high of 23 points joined by sibling Verania Willis with 18 points. On Nicaragua’s side, outside hitters Amalia Hernandez and Claudia Noguera topped with 15 and 11 tallies respectively.

Angela Willis said “we definitely learned our lesson today, the team was very weak and if we want to play at a higher competition level we must overcome our many mistakes and be responsible of imposing the rhythm during the game. We weren’t able to apply the tactical discipline that we should. I congratulate Nicaragua because if we played only with the half of their courage, we could have other results”.

“It was an intense match, Costa Rica recovered up to the fourth and fifth set because of their international experience. This result shows we are on the right track” expressed captain Claudia Noguera.

Argentinian coach Horacio Bastit indicated “it’s a challenge and a responsibility to win a Central American championship; we are re-structuring the team as we have seven U-23 players, it’s not an easy task, and it’s even harder than we thought. We must not give away points and mostly not to a team like Nicaragua who doesn’t hand out any points on their side and for me they are our toughest opponent.  Nicaragua took the initiative, they played better than we did, but even if we won playing badly, we learned today”.

Coach René Quintana of Nicaragua said “we made Costa Rica fall in our rhythm but they took advantage of their strongest attribute, their strength over the net.  Historically we have never extended a match against Costa Rica to five sets; in the end they deserved the victory. As one prepares for a Central American championship, you think about defeating Costa Rica and my team had a great performance today, doing what they know best”.