Nagoya, Japan, October 16, 2018 - Tijana Boskovic scored a match-high 29 points as Serbia beat Italy 3-1 (25-21, 25-19, 23-25, 25-23) in the third round at the FIVB Women's World Championship on Tuesday.
Serbia coach Zoran Terzic: We have already qualified for the semifinals. We tried to do our best today with motivation. We didn't play well in the last two matches of the second round after qualifying for the third round. We needed this game to play good again against a strong opponent in difficult situations. We must go on and play well in the semifinals.
Serbia captain Maja Ognjenovic: We were motivated because this was an important game. We are happy and proud of the result. We had good energy on defense. We hope to continue to play like tonight and like we did against Japan.
Serbia player Tijana Boskovic: We knew we had made the semifinals after beating Japan. Italy is a high-level team. We are happy with the performance and hope to play well in the semifinals.
Italy coach David Mazzanti: They (Serbia) played physically strong today. Their defense gave us trouble. We could not play our volleyball. We lack aggressiveness. We can still improve.
Italy captain Cristina Chirichella: We knew it was going to be a difficult match. All the teams here are high level. We were able to cope with their play sometimes.