Bangkok, Thailand, August 8, 2021 – Korea completed their Olympic campaign with a well-earned fourth place after losing a lopsided battle against European powerhouses Serbia in the third-place playoff match in the Tokyo 2020 volleyball tournament at Ariake Arena in Japan on Sunday.
Mighty Serbia, reigning European and world champions, cruised to a convincing straight-set 25-18, 25-15, 25-15 victory in 74 minutes to bag bronze medal, their second Olympic medal since they first picked up silver medal in the 2016 Rio Games following their upset 1-3 loss to eventual winners China in the final showdown.
Serbia sent their second-string squad to this year’s FIVB Volleyball Nations League in Rimini, Italy and the young team went down 1-3 to the Koreans in the round-robin preliminaries. Serbia came to the Tokyo with their top players led by left-hander Tijana Boskovic and they successfully avenged the loss by brushing off the Koreans in straight sets in the preliminary Pool A encounter earlier.
Tijana Boskovic’s 33-point performance including 25 attacks and 6 aces helped Serbia in their sweep of Korea in the Sunday’s bronze-medal match. Kim Yeon Koung only managed to score 11 points including 10 attacks for Korea, while Kim Heejin and Park Jeongah added 8 and 7 points respectively.
A trade of service blunders from both teams followed by an exchange of attacks that kept the score tied in the opening set, but Kim Heejin changed that pace for Korea with back-to-back aces to lead 8-6. Kim Yeon Koung kept her team’s offence going as they maintained the lead and Boskovic’s miscalculation on her attack swing gave her rivals a three-point edge at 13-10.
Boskovic redeemed herself in the succeeding plays with her triple attack winners that swung the momentum to the Serbian side. Yang Hyo Jin helped Korea with a tip to the middle to force another deadlock, but Milena Rasic and Boskovic started Serbia’s 6-0 run, scoring two points apiece to mount a 23-17 edge. Boskovic sealed the set 25-18 with a block to score her 14th point in the set.
In the second set, Boskovic kept the strong offensive pace of Serbia as she continued to produce winners on her attack swings. The Serbians doubled their advantage over the Koreans with 7-point clear at 14-7. Korea had some good moments on offence, but they had no solution to stop the Serbian opposite. Boskovic continued to score and closed the second set 25-15 with another attack point.
With five more points to score to seal the bronze medal win, Rasic contributed four points off three attacks and a block to reach match point, until a Korean attack error confirmed Serbia’s bronze medal victory at 25-15 in the third set.
Korea, current world No.12 and consecutive two-time Asian bronze medallists, had advanced to the Olympic semifinals for four times. In their first semifinal attempt in the 1972 Munich Games, the Koreans finished fourth place. They grabbed their first-ever Olympic medal in 1976 after claiming bronze medal at the Montreal Games. Korea made it to the semifinals again in the 2012 London Games and the Tokyo 2020, but similarly ended in fourth place.
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