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Venezuela stays in contention for fifth place defeating Panama

 

GATINEAU, Canada, June 16, 2011 - Maximo Montoya scored 14 points to lead Venezuela to a 25-20, 25-13, 25-15 victory over Panama in a consolation quarterfinal match on Thursday at the Pan American Cup men’s volleyball tournament.

 

With the victory Venezuela advances to the consolation semifinal to play one of the championship quarterfinal losers on Friday.  Meanwhile Panama will play for ninth place on Friday against the loser of the consolation quarterfinal between the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas.

 

Jhoser Contreras and Kevin Pinerua each scored 12 for Venezuela.  Panama’s top scorer was captain Ricardo Brown with nine.

 

‘’It was an important win for us,’’ said Venezuela’s head coach Idolo Herrera.  ‘’Panama has good players who know how to move.  But our defence was like a wall and Panama couldn’t get through.’’

 

‘’We had fun tonight,’’ added Pinerua. ‘’It was an intense match and we are finding our rhythm now.’’

 

‘’We were hoping for better,’’ said Panama’s coach Sergio Ballestas. ‘’The first set was tight but then we made too many errors.’’

 

‘’We used up a lot of energy in our last match against Bahamas and it showed today,’’ added Brown.