It was 1-0 and 24-19 for the Brazilians. It seemed that game is under the control of the South American players and they will soon be leading the Polish team by two sets. In the meantime cadre Stefano Lavarini scored five more points, stopping all those won by the Brazilians balls set. And that wasn't the end.
The Olympic record was broken after 24 years, and in a Polish women's match. No one has ever played such a long set.
The Polish team did not want to stop, but to use the excellent chance they had snatched. And they were incredibly close. They had seven balls to end this set, but unfortunately they did not manage to win it. The Brazilians gained six more opportunities to close the set and used the last one thanks to the effective attack of the receiver Gabi, their leader during the entire match. So they used only the eleventh (!) set ball, winning 38:36.
It's a pity that the Polish team didn't prove to be better in this set, because it turned out to be historic. Never before had such a high score been recorded in a women's volleyball tournament at the Olympics. The previous record was 34:32 from the final match of the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. There, the Russians beat the Cubans by that score, but they lost the match 2:3. Now, 24 years later, we had an even longer game.
However, in volleyball tournaments, there was once a higher score than the one in Sunday's match of the Polish women – also during the games in Sydney. Then, the first set of their match with Argentina ended with the score of 40:38 for the Italians. Italy won then 3:0.
Bravery against Brazil was not enough. Now the most important match in the modern history of Polish women's volleyball
AND the match between the Polish and Brazilian women ended with the same result. It was Jose Roberto Guimaraes' players who proved better in three sets (to 21, 36 and 14), although it is pleasing that the Polish volleyball players did not give up. It seemed that for the current vice-world champions it could be an easy victory, but thanks to Stefano Lavarini's team it was not. It is a pity that this will to fight for the Brazilians was not enough, and in both the first and the third set, which ended the match, they played at a level that was unattainable for them on Sunday.
The defeat in the last match before the quarterfinals, even though the Polish team had already secured their promotion, certainly hurts and may be worrying. On the other hand, what we saw in the second set suggests that the Polish team is capable of fighting with the best almost to the point of exhaustion. In this show of strength by Brazil, it was a small ray of hope, and also an indication that our team still has the factor of a winning mentality that coach Lavarini has been instilling in it for so long.
Maybe it's better that such a defeat happened now than in two days in the most important match for the Polish women's team in its modern history. It will be possible to digest it and draw the appropriate conclusions. It would be better not to watch such matches – dominated by the Polish rivals – at all, but maybe it's also a moment for reflection before the meeting with the Americans, which will decide whether the Polish team will play for a medal in Paris. I hope they find themselves in such excellent form that the Brazilians were in against them now.