Junior European Championship: Victory over Greece for seventh place

Serbia took seventh place at the European Championship for 19-year-olds in Burgas. The Serbian water polo players said goodbye to the competition with a victory over Greece 15:10 (5:3, 2:1, 3:2, 5:4) in the duel for the seventh position.

From the beginning, our team controlled the match. Greece equalized only once (1:1), but in the middle of the first part, the scoreboard read 5:1 for Serbia. Twice the Greeks came close to two goals behind (3:5 and 4:6). In the first attack in the second half, Serbia restored the four-goal advantage with a goal by Bodiroga (8:4). Since then, the difference was no less than three, and by the end it had grown to five goals.

Serbia played with: Dimković, Bodiroga 3, Gajić, Ilić, Kojić, Gladović 4, Antić, Đokanović 2, Danković 1, Jauković 1, Krstić 4, Novaković, Savić

Our national team finished the championship with four triumphs and two defeats, of which one was after the fifth round. In the group competition, they won first place with victories over Greece (14:9), Italy (15:14) and Germany (10:4). Our national team was stopped on the way to a medal by Montenegro, with a five-point victory in the quarter-finals (17:18). Then our team lost to Germany in the first match of the play-off from 5th to 8th place (10:13), but the tournament still ended with a victory.

Nebojša Novoselac, the coach of Germany, led the young Germans to a very valuable fifth place for them. In the match for the fifth position, the Germans quite convincingly defeated Italy 11:6.

European U19 Water Polo Championships, Burgas, seventh day

Finals: Montenegro - Croatia 8:10 (fives)

For the bronze medal: Hungary - Spain 14:16 (fives)

For fifth place: Germany - Italy 11:6

For seventh place: Serbia - Greece 15:10

Placing: 1. Croatia, 2. Montenegro, 3. Spain, 4. Hungary, 5. Germany, 6. Italy, 7. Serbia, 8. Greece, 9. Netherlands, 10 Turkey, 11. Romania, 12. Bulgaria, 13. France, 14. Malta, 15. Czech Republic, 16. Slovenia.