Yugoslavia - Portugal 3-0 (25-20, 25-23, 25-16)

Slobodan Boskan and Nikola Grbic celebrate a point

Cordoba, ARGENTINA, October 9 (fivb.ch) - In the first quarterfinals of the 2002 Men's World Championship, Yugoslavia defeated Portugal in straight sets. The Olympic champions are still undefeated and are getting closer to the title.

The match began promising for the Portuguese, who took an early lead. After the first technical time-out, Yugoslavia started building up the difference through to Ivan Miljkovic's effective and powerful serve. Portugal had an irregular performance with some good volleyball moments but, it was not enough to reverse the efficient Balkan routine. Yugoslavia won the first the set with a five point difference.

The second set's scoreboard was even, essentially because both teams made far too many unforced mistakes.

Nuno Pinheiro, the young Portuguese setter who had a high-quality performance, managed to change the ball speed and avoid the compact Yugoslavian blocking. But Portugal was not concentrated throughout the end of the set and made space for the Yugoslavians to grab the second set, also because of too many serve mistakes.

Portugal played the last set with an opaque game and could not offer real resistance to the powerful Yugoslavian game. Veselin Vukovic's team broke the Portuguese rhythm in all aspects through a clear and effective performance. Yugoslavia took the straight sets victory and will meet Brazil in Thursday's semifinal.