China beats Turkey 3-1 to finish third in FIVB Women's VNL finals

NANJING -- China defeated Turkey 25-23, 25-15, 20-25 and 25-21 to place third in the FIVB Women's Volleyball Nations League (VNL) finals here Sunday afternoon.

"We compete in every match with a firm determination to win it," said Liu Yanhan who led China with 23 points. "I've got a lot from the finals, and also improved a lot in my skills."

"As a team, our players are still young and have many weak points, and we hope to get better and better in our training," wing spiker Liu said after the third-place match which lasted one hour and 53 minutes.

Opposite spiker Gong Xianyu also scored 20 points for China, while wing spiker Ebrar Karakurt scored a match-high 31 points for Turkey, with teammate Meliha Ismailoglu adding 12 points. Throughout the match, Turkey made an astonishing 30 errors against 12 from China.

China scored four straight points to overtake the lead 9-8 from 5-8 down, and rallied back from 14-16 to tie at 21-all before taking the first set 25-23. During the set, both sides scored identical three blocks and one serve ace.

The second set found China lagging behind again at 4-6. But the host players had another four-point scoring spree for an 8-6 lead, rushed to 14-8 with two consecutive blocks and a serve ace en route to an easy win 25-15. The Chinese women made six blocks and four serve aces in the single set.

After losing the first two sets, the 2018 runner-up Turkey rallied from 3-6 to 7-6, and from 13-16 to 17-all before taking the third set 25-20 in a hurry. However, they were unable to stop the Chinese who led all the way from 8-7 to 16-12, even jumped to 20-14 and took the fourth set 25-21 to seal the match.