Netherlands sweep Azerbaijan

Their 26-24, 25-22, 26-24 victory gave them their second triumph in Osaka following a 3-2 win over Germany on Wednesday. For Azerbaijan, it was their second loss of Pool F but they only had themselves to blame after throwing away numerous opportunities to get on top of their opponents.

The Dutch have a 3-3 record in Pool F for fifth place though they have no chance of reaching the semi-finals while Azerbaijan, one day after a 3-2 win over USA, drop to 1-5 and lie in seventh, one place off the bottom.

This was expected to be among the tightest matches in the group given the two teams' similar strengths. It was Azerbaijan who took the early initiative, Mammadova, Yelena Parkhomenko and Inessa Korkmaz helping them to an 8-5 lead.

The Netherlands' main spiking weapon, Manon Flier, struggled to find her rhythm against an aggressive Azerbaijan, who were looking to atone for a series of disappointing results in Sapporo's Pool B last week.

But a Dutch time-out at 10-5 down seemed to do the trick as they fought back to 12-11 before the Azers decided they needed a time-out themselves to sort out their suddenly erratic defence.

Alice Blom's superb drop-shot levelled it for the Dutch at 14-14 but then she sent a spike well long to give Azer a 16-15 second time-out advantage.

Mammadova was having trouble with her left-sided attacks and it was one of her errors that gave the Dutch a 20-19 lead, after Chaine Staelens had brought them to within striking distance.

The 195cm Mammadova, with 122 spikes before this game, finally unleashed a winner from the left to bring Azer to within 21-22 and two spikes from the right by Korkmaz tied it at 23-23.

But the Dutch had the final say in the set when Mammadova was late for a spike down the middle and the Netherlands defence easily blocked.

Clearly rattled after losing the first set, Azerbaijan faced a 1-5 deficit in the second thanks to some errors of judgment and great Dutch defence, led by captain Ingrid Visser.

But Azer battled back and Parkhomenko's left-sided spike levelled the score at 5-5. Oksana Mammadyarova's fine block from the middle gave Azer an 8-7 first time-out lead.

Azerbaijan have shown a reluctance to hold on to leads all tournament, but after trading blows with the Dutch, managed to sneak ahead 16-15.

Mammadova was hit and miss on the left and Mammadyarova and Korkmaz were willing to take up the slack for Azer. For the Dutch, Visser, Flier and Staelens were constant threats.

They helped Netherlands hit back from 18-16 down to lead 21-20 as both teams started to make mistakes.

Indeed, it was mistakes that allowed the Dutch to surge ahead and eventually take the set 25-22.

The Netherlands took a 8-6 third-set lead on Visser's swift spike down the middle as Azerbaijan struggled to get back into the game. They then went 10-7 up but Mammadova produced her best form of the match to help her side tie the set at 10-10.

However, it was not enough to prevent Netherlands taking a 16-14 lead into the second time out.

Despite being tracked for the rest of the set, Netherlands closed the match when Mammadova's spike crashed into the net.

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