Brave Noliko MAASEIK survives in Sofia for a thrilling win in five sets
Jelte Maan and Nathan Wounembaina were the best scorers in the match both ending up with 21 points for the Belgian champions.
Noliko started the game with good confidence after last week’s win over CSKA in Maaseik and took an early lead at 8:6.
However, the home team managed to fight back and equalized at 10:10 thanks to some piece of great blocking by captain Nikolay Ivanov.
CSKA had the lead at 16:14 and 22:19 but Noliko made it even at 22 all after some powerful services by Cameroonian Nathan Wounembaina.
However, the experienced players of the Bulgarian team kept their rhythm and won the first set with the score of 26-24.
The teams exchanged the next two sets showing great blocks.
CSKA registered a total of 20 killing blocks while Noliko responded with 18 for the whole match.
CSKA took the lead in the fourth set at 8:6 but Noliko managed to make it 13:10 after some pieces of great setting by Yannick van Harskamp.
MAASEIK extended its lead to 18:13 but that was not all for the match and thanks to the great performance delivered by middle-blocker Evgeni Ivanov CSKA came back to only one point deficit at 18:19.
The mentor of Noliko Vital Heynen made the necessary adjustments to the organization of his team and the set was finally for the visiting team.
In the tie-break Noliko opened an early lead at 4:2 and 6:4 but inspired by the faithful home crowd CSKA took the lead at the technical time-out (8:7).
Noliko made it 10:8 and then 12:9.
An ace from Jason Haldane gave some more hope to the home crowd at 11:12 but that was all for the Reds from Sofia and Noliko took the set and the match.
