Russia won the pool F after beating defending champions Brazil in three sets. For Russia coach Vladimir Alekno it was still an honour to beat Brazil in a match between two sides who had already qualified for the semifinals.
“I would like to split the meaning of this match in two: one – the final standing, and two – sport value. Maybe the first one was not so important, but the second one was,” said Russian head coach after the match.
“I want to apologize to the fans, because we didn't play well,” Brazil coach Bernardo Rezende said. “All players from today's game played in last year's finals, they were the stars. Maybe they played less in this year's tournament, but they were not reserve players. We tried to win, but we couldn't.”
With Europe v Europe and South America v South America in Saturday’s semifinals, Argentina play Brazil at 17:15 (local time) followed by Russia against Poland at 20:00.
