The Panthers heavily relied on their 'Big Three' formed by opposite Isabelle Haak and outside hitters Zhu Ting and Gabriela 'Gabi' Guimarães to triumph, as they combined to produce 57 points - the Swedish, who earned the match's MVP award, led the way with 21 (18 kills, two aces, one block), the Chinese contributed 19 (18 kills, one block) and the Brazilian added 17 (16 kills, one block).
"It was a really tough match today," Haak remarked. "We started well, but then we were just making too many errors, and Chieri took advantage of it. But I'm happy that we managed to win a very difficult match and to take two very important points."
Chieri had two players matching Haak's production on their side - world champion outside hitter Stella Nervini, who left the court with 21 kills to her name, and Hungarian opposite Anett Németh, who got to the same amount of points with 17 kills, two blocks and two aces.
Numia Vero Volley Milano took advantage of Chieri's defeat to beat them for third place, getting to 43 points (14 wins, five losses) to their rivals' 41 with a 3-0 (25-18, 25-19, 25-19) victory over Bartoccini-Mc Restauri Perugia on Sunday. Opposite Paola Egonu topped all scorers with 18 points (16 kills, two blocks) while outside hitter Rebecca Piva tallied 17 (14 kills, three blocks) and earned the MVP award.
