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Flash Quotes

General Quotes

PAUL LACIGA:

About the court temperature which reached 102 degrees during the match:

"I played badly.  It was easy for the Argentineans to play against us today. We need one or two days to get used to (the climate) here.  Maybe we can do better tomorrow."

About the depth of the sand on the court:

"It is about the same as the FIVB.   We normally don't have as much sand. Playing at 12 o'clock,  I'm not used to it."

MARK LACIGA:

About heat/humidity:

"The conditions are Okay.  It's very humid.   The heat  is okay.  We play in Brazil in conditions like this.  We play in Rio with nearly 100 % humidity. It's just coming here and getting used to the time change.  You have problems with that because we just arrived from Europe."

ESTEBAN MARTINEZ:

About heat/humidity:

"For us It was really difficult.  For the last two weeks, we stayed in Berlin and Italy.  It's harder to breath as games go on."

About the venue:

"We liked (the conditions for) the match.. It's the first time we've played in New York.  It's very organized and we have really been helped."

"Normally we play behind the beach.  This has the view-very beautiful."

About the sand depth:

"We play a grand slam event in Portugal in two weeks, and it's the same sand."

MARTIN CONDE:

Conditions:

"It was very hot.  It wasn't that the match was too long.  We wanted to get the match over very quickly (because of the humidity). The stadium is closed, so there is no wind.  It's hard to breathe."

Post-match visit Conde took to training station before interview due to dehydration:

"I could have continued to play, if I had to."

About playing in Central Park:

"It's a beautiful setting.  I never thought that I would play in Central Park in my life."

MARK HEESE:

About Central Park and Goodwill Games:

"We're excited to be here at the Goodwill Games.   The first match was certainly not the way we wanted to start the tournament.   We played quite poorly, but its wasn't because of any extra pressure from the other team."

JOHN CHILD:

About unforced errors:

"I don't know what the stats were, but they must have been pretty ugly.  They weren't putting any pressure on us.  Just poor decisions and poor execution by us".

Controversial line call appeal:

"Very rarely a referee will change their call when a linesman and a referee himself both called it out immediately.  Karch talked to the ref.  The umpire from the far line came over just to the referee.  You can ask the referee this, but I think he had checked the ball mark on the line, which you are allowed to do.  However, on the play, Mark had dove on the line, so the line had since moved."

MARK HEESE:

Hot sand (courtside temperatures reach 110 degrees during the match):

"I like a descent approach to my spike serve.   The sand was extra hot and my feet were burning.  I couldn't stand still to start my approach."

KIRALY:

About first match:

"It was a little easier match than I had anticipated.   I've seen the Canadian team play, and I don't think that they had a good match.   It's definitely hot out there, but it's nothing that we're not used to.  But because we're only playing one match to 15 (each day) in pool play, I see no problem going into the weekend and playing two out of three."

About the heat/humidity:

"It's pretty warm out there.  But we played in Belmar all weekend and played some long matches including a 3-hour one on Saturday in heat almost as bad as this.  It was probably an ideal way to prepare for this tournament in the same time zone and same kind of conditions."

About unforced errors in match:

"I don't know that the match that was played out there was played all that well by either team.  Our opponents made some hitting errors to give us probably four or five points on errors.  And that was probably the difference."

About Central Park setting:

"I think it's a great site.  The backdrop is beautiful.  It's going to be especially gorgeous in the evening with the lights of the buildings behind. Also that fact that it will be cooler, you'll probably see a little more energetic play."

About depth of sand:

"It's deep.  It's like a reach beach."

About the setting sun:

LEE ZAHNER:

"The sun at the last section of the game seemed to be in the perfect position right in my eyes when I was receiving the ball.  I mean it's not an excuse.  I felt that I couldn't distinguish the distance between myself and the net.  I gave a few bad passes to Julien which caused him to set the ball not exactly where I needed it.  I guess we let them off the hook a bit there."

About playing the defending GWG Champions:

JULIEN PROSSER:

"I don't think it really matters that they did well in the last GWG, but that was a long time ago and a lot of things have changed since then. They were just a team that we've played sometimes on the FIVB series and we have beaten them before it's just a matter of pulling it together for this tournament and we just didn't complete the game plan properly."

About playing in NYC:

LEE ZAHNER:

"I think it's great.  I really enjoyed playing here.  The fact that we're in the middle of a huge city is fantastic.  It's a perfect site for beach volleyball here."

About the setting sun:

Jan Kvalheim:

"I don't really think that the sun or the heat was any issue in this game.  I think that all of the players are used to playing in strong heat conditions. I think that at the end of the game it was difficult to play on that side (east side of court) even though it was the best wind side because the sun was coming very low and it's hard to see the ball even if you wear glasses.  We knew before the game that it was going to be a very close game and I think we had problems setting because the ball was so wet.  The fingers and hands were so wet so we had some bad setting, but Bjorn made some crucial digs and we made the point right after so that was very important for this game."

About being the defending GWG Champs:

Bjorn Maaseide:

"We play pretty much every weekend from May until October, but the GWG is some sort of  small Olympics where you feel you represent your country.  It's more heavy weight.  People care more what you do and of course, you know we won in St. Petersburg and it would be nice to win again."

About any changes in GWG from last time:

Bjorn Maaseide:

"The sport has developed.  We used to play in tournaments with 24 teams and now we're playing with 32 teams in the main draw and there are 80 or 90 teams in the qualification.  The depth of the tour is just so much more heavy.  Last weekend, we lost against in Poland in the first round and we hadn't lost in the first round in 2 years."

About playing in the heat and humidity:

Bjorn Maaseide:

"Hot blooded Norwegians.  Well prepared.   The Vikings!  Actually, we did some testing with the Olympic committee and we're in pretty good shape conditioning wise - for volleyball players."

About the one match per day format:

Bjorn Maaseide:

"Sometimes, it's even harder to play just once because you've gotta play one game and it's that game and only that game."

Jan Kvalheim:

"I think in this tournament there are more tactics involved.  Because when you play in  (other ) tournaments, when you win the game you know you have two hours to think about the next game and you don't know who you're going to play until one hours or two hours before.  We woke up this morning and we knew for two or three weeks we'd be playing Australia today.  We know this team because we played against them for five years. And now tomorrow, we only play Argentina, so  I think the games will be more strategic than in a normal tournament."

About the turning point of the match:

Jan Kvalheim:

"I think when we made some bad hitting, they made a defense, but we got some blocks.  I think Bjorn had two or three blocks when I hit some bad hittings. That was very important in the middle of the game because if they had these two or three points they would have a lead of three or four points."

Bjorn Maaseide:

"We converted good.  When we dug, we scored at every opportunity we had. Maybe we missed once, actually."

About winning tomorrow?

Jan Kvalheim:

"It's very difficult to play against Argentina because they have such good ball control.  Usually when we play them, we say to each other , Okay, we have to be patient.  We have to hit two, three, four times in the same rally before we make the point because they are such good defensive players and the ball goes back and forth.  We have to be patient and we need a good serve to win that game.   I think we have to serve better than today, but it's also difficult to serve because the ball is a little bit slippy and your hands are sweating so it's not so easy to have the good feeling as you're used to having."