The junior water polo team of Montenegro ended the European Championship with a victory.
It did not improve the impression, the triumph (13:12) over Germany brought only seventh place at the tournament in Podgorica, where expectations and ambitions were much higher.
"It's not easy to play matches like this, because we didn't even plan to play them. We expected more, at least a place in the semi-finals, so playing from 5th to 8th place was very difficult for us. However, we had to find a motive, it always has to that it exists when playing for the national team. Let this EP be a good school for us for the next period," said coach Milan Ćirović.
Against the Germans, Montenegro justified its role as the favorite, but it showed two faces - in the first half, it scored 10 goals, led by five points, then stopped completely, wasted attacks easily, and gave the rival a chance to fully return to the match.
This led to an exciting finish, and after Germany equalized at 12:12, the moment of decision was seen 90 seconds before the end when David Stevović shook the net for the final score in an attack with a player more.
"We must not allow defeats like the one against Croatia on Friday, nor the third quarter like the one we played against Germany. I'm sorry for the poor placement, I'm also sorry that we didn't meet the expectations in the tournament that was phenomenally organized by Water polo association and the Capital City. We didn't see ourselves in the matches from fifth to eighth place, the wishes were bigger, but it seems that this is our reality at the moment," Ćirović pointed out.
In the last game, Matija Sladović was the most effective with four goals, three by Stevović, two by Petar Vujošević, and one each by Vladan Vukićević, Milan Nikaljević, Marko Bošković and Lazar Vukićević.
The new champion of Europe is Serbia, which was better than Spain in the final (9:8), while the bronze went to Hungary after the victory over Greece (10:7).
Bonus video:
