Mexico wins a battle against Venezuela

GUADALAJARA, Mexico, October 24, 2011 – Mexico scored a 3-1 (25-23, 25-20, 26-28, 25-21) victory over Venezuela in its first outing at the men’s volleyball tournament of the XVI Pan American Games Guadalajara 2011 on Monday night.

Veteran Ivan Contreras was the biggest contributor to the offense of Mexico with 20 points, all via attacks, while Tomas Aguilera added 15 including four blocks. Carlos Guerra and Gustavo Meyer finished with 16 and 15 respectively. Venezuela’s Ivan Marquez charted 12 points while Jhoser Contreras added 11. Jesús Chourio, Kervin Pinerua finished with 10 apiece.

Mexico held the slight margin in the departments of blocking 8-7 and service winners 4-3.

Iván Contreras (Captain of Mexico): “On paper, we knew that from or three rivals Venezuela was the easiest one. They played a good match, and made some mistakes that helped us to get the result, especially in the fourth set. Tomorrow and after tomorrow we will have more difficult matches, but at least we already have a victory.”

Kevin Piñerua (Captain of Venezuela): “I am very happy for our performance. This was our first match at the Pan Am Games. This is a young team. We want to get experience and we are doing it. We have some goals ahead and we are here playing.”

Jorge Azair (Coach of Mexico): “I think winning is always good. Fortunately we won today. We have to improve in some situations, playing more aggressively but at the same time with more calm against the upcoming teams, that are very tough. We stabilized our service a little bit as well as our reception. That will help us to be more productive in our attack and counterattacks.”

Gilberto Herrera (Coach of Venezuela): “I can’t ask for more. This is the first international match played by this team, a very young one. If we had more than 30 matches a year the situation would have been different.”