By Victor Kanayo
Nigeria Volleyball team have qualified for the quarterfinal of the ongoing 2022 African U21 Men’s Nations Volleyball Championship holding in Tunisia despite suffering first defeat.
The Nigerian team will face Libya in the last eight encounter.
Host Tunisia beat Nigeria 3-0 (25-21, 25-18, 25-23) in front of their home fans on Wednesday in the last group match.
At the end of the cracker, Tunisia won 32 points from service and 43 points from receives while Nigeria won 20 points from service and 42 points from receives.
Tunisia had four aces, nine maximum points in a row, 10 service errors and used two timeouts while Nigeria had one ace, four maximum points in a row, nine service errors and used five timeouts.
The Head Coach of Nigeria U21 Men’s Team, Sani Mohammed, said the boys lost due to errors and the crowd which will be corrected.
Mohammed said finishing second and securing a quarterfinal spot was an indication the team has potential of making it to the final.
He said, “The loss to Tunisia is a wake up call to the team. We cannot afford to make mistakes in the quarterfinals because it means we are out of the title race. Nigeria played against the crowd, they came out to support their team and Tunisia won.
“The coaching crew have studied the match against Tunisia and all the lapses noticed will be worked on. If you look critically at the minor scores, Nigeria were leading before Tunisia came from behind to win the first and third set.
“Our match against Libya will be taken with high level of seriousness because we do not want to let the nation down.”
