India hammered out their first win at the 2023 FIVB Volleyball Men's U21 World Championship in Bahrain on Thursday and it proved sufficient for a spot in the third-tier foursome, along with Canada, Czechia and Egypt, that will distribute the places from ninth to 12^th in the final standings of the tournament.

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Pool G

India produced their first victory of the tournament and set themselves up for possible advancement to the semifinals for distribution of the places from ninth to 12^th, depending on the last Pool G match later on Thursday. The Indians hammered out an emphatic shutout of Tunisia. Their regular high scorer Aman Kumar signed off with 18 points, all in attack, while middle Sachin Dagar impressed with six kill blocks towards a 12-point tally. The only other player to reach the double digits in this match was their teammate Tanish Choudhary, who scored nine spiking points, an ace and a kill block.

Canada showed no mercy for Bahrain, who had a shot at overtaking India for the second place in the pool, and defeated the home team by . Spearheaded by Sayed Hashem Ali, the Bahrainis put up quite a battle, especially in the third set, which they won deep in the overtime, but will have to join the weekend race for the 13^th place in the final standings. Ali registered the match high of 20 points, followed by his teammate and captain Husain Ehsan with 15. Spencer Grahame was Canada’s leading scorer with 14 points, the best of five players on the North American squad to reach the double digits in the game. Canada topped the pool unbeaten in three matches played.

Pool H

In a head-to-head clash between two winless teams, Mexico celebrated their first victory of the tournament, over their North American neighbours United States. Both teams will continue their participation in the World Championship in the matches for the distribution of the places from 13^th to 16^th in the final standings. Actually, the Americans did better than the Mexicans in attack and especially in blocking (12 stuffs against six), but the abundant unforced errors prevented them from taking something more than a set in this game. Jorge Hernandez Cabrera led the winners with 17 points, followed by Ramon Gonzalez Castro with 12, including two aces. USA’s Dillon Klein delivered the match high of 20 points. His teammates Zachary Rama with 15 points and Alexander Rottman with 12 were the other two players to reach the double digits in scoring.

Czechia produced a victory over Egypt in a direct duel for the first place in Pool H and finished unbeaten on top of the pool standings. Both the Czechs and pool runners-up Egypt, who finished on a 2-1 win-loss record, will continue in the race for the distribution of the places from ninth to 12^th in the final World Championship standings. Czech opposite David Kollator nailed five aces and raised three stuffs towards the match high of 25 points. His teammate Jiri Benda added another 17 points towards the victory, including two aces and three kill blocks. Captain Zyad Mohamed led Egypt with 20 points, followed by Abdelrahman Mohammmed with 12 and Hamza Awad with 11.

2023 FIVB Volleyball Men's U21 World Championship: full schedule and results

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