Jiangmen, China, January 7, 2020 - Thomas Edgar tallied 30 points including 26 attacks and 4 aces to lead Australia to a 3-2 (23-25, 25-23, 26-24, 20-25, 19-17) victory over Korea in pool B of the AVC Men's Continental Tokyo Volleyball Qualification on Tuesday.
Korea head coach Im Dohun acknowledged the defeat but was pleased with his team's performance against Australia. "My team played exceptionally by giving it all. As a result, we seemed to lack in luck this time. We will just focus and do whatever possible to fight for the semifinal berth."
The same feelings were expressed by Korea captain Shin Yung-suk, who gave his teammates credit for their fighting spirit. "We accept the result as we really tried our utmost. We will just focus on the following matches."
Australia head coach Mark Lebedew was satisfied with the result and underlined the importance of the challenge ahead for his team. "When we play such an important tournament, the price is that we want to win pretty badly. Sometimes the mental and psychological parts of the game are the most difficult part to master. Today it’s good to see that on the outside we had some very strong moments when team Korea put us under a lot of pressure. Both teams can say they deserved to win this match but luckily for us, we won the last point. The victory is very important as we can take more confidence into the match against Qatar tomorrow."
Australia captain Harrison Peacock put the emphasis on some of the ups and downs in the match. "It was a strange game with a lot of changes of momentum. We kind of struggled a bit to find our consistency. But in the end, what matters is that we won the game. I am very happy with it."
And Australia player Jordan Richards said just how well Korea had played. "I knew it was going to be a tough game because it’s Korea. We just did our job and were patient because we knew Korea was going to make a lot of defences and great strategical plays. When it came to the third set, team Korea put a lot of energy into it and a couple of strong services, which was quite impressive. Congratulations to them because they really played very well. It surprised us a bit, but after we regrouped, we were able to adjust and win. It’s a very important win for us of course.”