“Wins are more important than performances right now. It means 3 points”
“Today, I want to emphasize that we got three points.”
Jung Kwan-jang holds off a late charge from IBK in the first match of the fifth round, earning three points to stay in the hunt for third place.
Jung Kwan-jang won the first match of the Dodram 2023-2024 V League Round 5 against IBK IBK Enterprise Bank 3-1 (30-28, 25-17, 23-25, 25-17) in straight sets at Chungmu Gymnasium in Daejeon on Monday.
With the victory, Jung Kwan-jang, who has 12 wins and 13 losses, added three more points to reach 39 points and move within four points of third-place GS Caltex (15 wins and 9 losses – 43 points). On Jan. 18, the team met up with IBK in the final game of Round 4, which they won 3-0. We met again in the first game of Round 5, making it a revenge match, and I was curious to see the outcome. In the fourth round, we won easily with Mega’s explosion, but on this day, IBK fought back.
They took the lead in the first set and almost lost it, but won 30-28 on deuce. After winning the second set easily, the team jumped out to an early lead in the third set and went up 3-0. However, they gave up one point to IBK, and eventually lost 23-25. In the fourth set, they also took a big lead early on, but were down by two points, 17-15. This time, it was different from the third set. Jia and Lee So-young’s attacks brought the score back to four points, and they held on for the win.
Before the match “Rounds 5 and 6 are about winning. One loss will lead to two and three losses. We will play with the mindset of winning the whole match.” Coach Ko Hee-jin said after the match, “I want to emphasize that we won three points today,” and added, “There were some plays that showed that we hadn’t played in a long time, but we still managed to win the fourth set. It’s more important to win now than to play well. They did a good job,” and praised the players.
“We have a lot to talk about today, but I think we need to focus more on preparing for the next match against Hyundai E&C than today,” Ko said, meaning that they will not break the good mood of the victory by talking about what went wrong, but will continue their winning momentum against the top-ranked Hyundai E&C.
“Hyundai E&C has a good setter, Kim Da-in, who sees our blockers and takes them out. “Of course, it should be a basic serve and serve-receive battle. We’ve been practicing defense and blocking, and I think we can play a good game if we get that part right.”