China's Tian Jia/Wang Jie Net 2nd Preliminary Win in Beach Volleyball

Chinese women beach volleyball pair Tian Jia/Wang Jie scored their second victory in the preliminaries at the Beijing Olympics on Monday, defeating a Belgian pair.

With the win, the Chinese pair, which defeated a Swiss duo in the first preliminary match on August 9, have good chance in earning a berth in top 16.

The Chinese achieved the hard-won victory 2-1 (18-21, 21-19, 15-13) over Liesbeth Mouha and Liesbet Van Breedam of Belgium.

They said they were satisfied with the result.

"At some time we didn't play to our normal standard, but I'm happy with the result," said the 24-year-old Wang after the match.

"They are a strong team and we were defeated by them before. So we have made preparations for the match with them," she said.

Lacking efficient organization in attacks and ways of counter-attacks, the Chinese lost the first set 18-21.

Both the second and the third sets were games of exchanging scoring as the two duos made mistakes and had efficient attacks as well.

A failure in service by the Belgians ended the third set and the host outscored the visitors 15-13.

"We tried out best but we lost, we are unsatisfied with the result," Van Breedam said.

This was the second loss for the Belgian pair, which was defeated by Norway's Maaseide/Glesnes in the first preliminary match on August 9.

(Xinhua News Agency August 11, 2008)

Related Stories