NAGOYA, Japan, Sept. 8 (Xinhua) -- China cruised past South Korea in straight sets at the 2017 FIVB Volleyball Women's World Grand Champions Cup here on Friday.
Zhang Changning got 15 points to lead the game, including nine spikes and four blocks. Zhu Ting was replaced in the later half of the game after scoring nine points, all from spikes, in the lopsided match, which finished in 25-14, 25-4 and 25-12.
"We lost to the power and the height of China. Once again the game reminded us of the fact that China is the highest and best team of the world," said Hong Sungjin, the South Korean coach.
He added that the South Korean team was still young and in the process of learning, and "it's very important that many of our players learned from today's game with China."
An Jiajie, coach of the Chinese team, said that his team carried out well the strategic instructions from the coaches and did well in serving and blocking.
During the later half of game, he replaced some of the experienced players with younger ones to help them gain more experiences.
"They played as they should have, but there were still some deficiencies, including problem with connectivity, and we will summarize and deal with these problems," added An.
With three victories in a row, China holds the first place for now among the six teams competing in the tournament.
In another game earlier in the day, the U.S. beat Russia 3-2 (23-25, 25-21, 19-25, 25-21, 15-9) and Japan is set to play Brazil later.
