By Bruce Wigo
BEIJING, China, August 20. BEFORE this Olympic tournament began, the top four teams were expected to be Hungary and the three Balkan nations of Serbia, Croatia and Montenegro. With the U.S. and Hungary coming out on top of their respective groups, it meant that at most, only two of the Balkan powers would live up to their pre-tournament expectations.
The first game of the semifinals pitted Croatia, the 2007 FINA World Champions against Montenegro. In July, in Malaga, Spain, the Montenegrans, with the most vocal and ardent supporters in the stands, won the 2008 European Championship. The Montenegran team did not have the most talented or skilled players in Malaga, but their motivation and drive, buoyed by ardent nationalism and the pride of playing for their tiny nation, for the first time in the Europe's main event, overcame any deficiencies. That fervent enthusiasm was evident once again in their play today.
In an exciting and heated game, Montenegro scored the first three goals and Croatia's Samir Barak hit the post on a penalty shot before the Croats finally got on the scoreboard. In the second quarter, Montenegro stretched their lead to 4 -1. Croatia was never able to recover and the game ended with Montenegro winning 7 – 6.
Montenegro will now play Hungary in a rematch of the European Championship final.
Any notion that Serbia had intentionally played poorly against Italy in preliminary play, so they could have an easier route to the gold medal game by playing the U.S. were quickly dispelled from the opening whistle. Serb All-World goalkeeper, Denis Sefik, was still on the bench and the Serbs were held scoreless in the first quarter. Spain's 1-0 lead was short-lived however. Serbia took control of the game with five goals in the second, and eased into the semi-finals with a 9 -5 win, even though their star player and the tournament's leading scorer, Alexandar Sapic, was scoreless in eight attempts. With the win, the Serbs now advance to the semifinals against the United States.
Both semifinal games will be rematches from group play. Serbia won a defensive battle against the United States, 4-2, and Hungary and Montenegro tied 10-all.
In other matches today, Italy beat Canada 13-11 and Greece beat host China 13-8 in the 7th-12th classification round.
