Ningbo, China, June 12, 2016 - China claims a triple crown at the World Grand Prix first weekend. The team recorded only one set loss after defeating USA 3-1 (25-20, 25-19, 15-25, 25-23). Once again Zhu Ting led her team to win a full package of points, scoring 17 points.
USA's middle blocker Foluke Akinradewo finished with one point less, scoring 16 points. Both teams have long history of encounters at the World Grand Prix, with 34 after today's match. China have won 21, while USA 13 of their matches. Their last eight matches were ended in favour of the American team. USA is one of the teams China has been playing against the most in World Grand Prix with only Brazil being ahead with 35 matches.
A spike by Zhu Ting and block by Yunli Xu opened the match with 3-0 for China. Gong added an ace for 6-2 and forced USA to take the first time out to cool things down. Challenge call, a block by USA team and two errors in reception of the Chinese team and USA tied at 6-6. China took the lead back at first TTO 8-6 and increased it to 12-8 after an ace by Ding. USA called a time out and Kimberly Hill's good play in attack and block gave USA 2 more points, but China kept the advantage at the second TTO with 16-11. Hill remained the brighest player of her team, but it wasn't enough against Chinese who carried on the lead 18-14. With a good blocking play USA cut the gap to 22-20 and China called a time out. The break did help the hosting team, who ended the set with a spike by Zhang at 25-20.
The second sets started off tied, with teams fighting action by action until 8-7 for China at first TTO. A few mistakes from USA and good offensive play of XU gave China 12-9. Both teams used challenge in the next actions, but China kept its 14-11 lead. Hill and Akinradewo stepped in, scoring three points in a row. Nervous China made an error allowing USA to tie at 15-15 and go 16-15 ahead at second TTO. But the American team weren't able to find their rhythm at the service line, losing points in this element. An exchange of attack between Zhu and Akinradewo brought back a close game, but USA were still 2 pts behind and called a time-out. That didn't help the team, as China continued it's great play in block and attack with Zhang finishing the set with an ace at 25-19.
Motivated by the 2-0 score, USA stormed in the third set with 4-1 lead. This melts to 8-6 at the first technical time out, but great performance for Jordan Larson-Burbach and inforced mistakes of China gave USA 13-8, coach Lang Ping called a time out for her team. USA's force is unstoppable and the team increases its lead to 15-8 after a block on Zhu. Both teams exchanged spikes, but USA didn't let the set slip from their hands and sealed the deal with a spike of Harmotto at 25-15.
The fourth set begins with a close fight, but it was USA that took 8-6 lead at the first TTO. China quickly tied at 8-8, but Harmotto's kill blocks put USA back ahead. good performance of Zhang and a challenge puts China back ahead at 13-11 with the lead maintained and increased to 19-15 when Zhu jumps in to help her team. Time out called by USA paid off with team chasing the score to 19-19. Tight fight continued with China staying a point ahead. A block by Xu gave China first match point, saved with a spike by Robinson. A challenge of Murphy's serve brought USA the point back, but China still had a match point, used by Zhang. Another challenge called by USA was unsuccessful, proving that the ball went off the block. Hosting team wrapped up the match 25-23.