China celebrate win over Croatia with Antonija Mišura(#6) looking on
Women’s Basketball: Croatia suffered a disappointing defeat at the hands of China, putting their quarterfinal hopes at risk. Croatia started off well and only trailed by three after the first quarter. China turned it on late in the second at went into the half up 10. China came out of the half and went on a 12-5 run, effectively putting the game out of reach. It ended China 83, Croatia 58. Sandra Mandir led Croatia with 22 points. Croatia’s stars against the U.S, Jelena Ivezić and Maria Vrsaljko, couldn’t get it going and shot a combined 4/15. The bad news for the Croatians is that with three games remaining in the group stage, Croatia will need to win at least two to advance to the quarterfinals. The good news is that they play the three weakest teams in the group and 3rd place in the group is not out of the question. They play Czech Republic on Wednesday. The Czechs lost to China by nine and Turkey by four. The Czechs are ranked 4th in the world however so Croatia will come in as underdogs once again.
“Croatians are very skillful and better than us in 1-on-1. We changed the defense to zone in the second quarter, which was the key to the victory”
~Chinese coach Sun Fengwu
“I don’t know why. We had too many mistakes, and turnovers. I don’t know what the problem with our defense is”
~Croatian coach Stipe Bralić
Croatian women celebrate first win
Women’s Handball: Croatia easily defeated Angola in their second match of the group stage. The final score was 28-23. The first half was back and forth and Croatia were down 9-11 with 4 minutes to go in the first half before they went on an 8-0 run led by winger Dijana Jovetić and Kristina Franić. Maja Zebić scored nine goals, converting all five of Croatia’s penalties. She now leads all players in the tournament with 14 goals. Jovetić is third with 10 goals. Croatia plays Russia in their next match on Wednesday. Russia is 2-0, beating Angola by 3 and Great Britain by 21.
“I know that these are our first Olympic games, our first real tournament and my girls still feel the pressure. Today they played phenomenal against Angola. Then the nerves kicked in, just like against Brazil when we lost. I don’t think that the girls are too intimidated by the big crowds because we played in a similar type of atmosphere in Rijeka against Denmark. However, we must solve that psychological problem.”
~Croatian manager, Vladimir Canjuga
Andrej Gaćina played 7 sets on Monday
Table Tennis: Andrej Gaćina upset the 16th ranked Alexander Shibaev in a 7 set thriller that took nearly an hour. Gaćina had a chance to wrap up the game in the 6th set but lost five points in a row. He recovered quickly and redeemed himself with a great 7th set performance. Later in the day, he faced the 5th seed, Chih-Yuan Chuang, in the round of 16. Andrej was dominated in the first three sets by the clearly superior player in Chuang, but fought back to take the fourth and fifth, showing some great resilience. Gaćina fell in the sixth set and lost but considering he is ranked 58th in the world, these Olympics will go down as a great success for him.
Kim Pavlin was just happy to be there
Swimming: Kim Pavlin finished 30th out of 34th in the 200 IM prelims. After the race, the Texas-born Pavlin tweeted, “THANK YOU everyone! Wasn’t the best result I hoped for but was the BEST experience! Thankful to God… Now PUMPED for 200 BK on Thursday!” Kim will be a sophomore at Texas A&M this fall.
Marin Čilić in action against Jurgen Melzer
Tennis: Marin Čilić played Jurgen Melzer in his 1st round match at Wimbledon. Čilić got an early break only for Melzer to break back at 5-4. Čilić would go on to win the tiebreaker and take a 1-0 lead. The match was not without controversy as Melzer complained about a lineswoman’s decisions on several key points. On one point, when he was in his backswing his racquet struck her causing him to miss the ball and lose the point. On a break point for Čilic at the start of the second set, Melzer’s shot was called wide by her which prompted him to question whether the judge was Croatian and ask that she be replaced. The match went on however and Čilić broke again and held serve to finish the second set 6-2 and take the match. He plays in the second round against Lleyton Hewitt tomorrow morning. A win against Hewit will see him face the winner of Djoković vs Roddick. In double Čilić and Ivan Dodig made quick work of their Colombian opponents, winning 6-3, 6-4, in a match that lasted for 53 minutes. Čilić and Dodig play their second round (round of 16) match tomorrow and it will be interesting to see if fatigue is a factor for Čilić, who will be playing four matches in two days. Their opponents will be doubles specialists Robert Lindstedt and Johan Brunstrom of Sweden. Lindstedt typically partners with Horia Tecau (Romania) and they have been runners-up at Wimbledon for the past three years. Brunstrom is less well known, ranked 72nd in doubles. The pair took down Djoković/Troicki today in straight sets, holding their serve throughout.
Shooting: Bojan Durković finished 36th and Petar Gorsa finished 43rd out of 47 in the 10m air rifle prelims.
Tina Mihelić finished 13th on Monday
Sailing: It was a tough day at sea for Ivan Glaspić as he finished 7th and 9th in the third and fourth races of the Finn competition. He is now part of a four way tie for 3rd with 7 races remaining. In the laser competition, Tonči Stipanović sailed his way into 3rd overall with a 5th and 6th place finish in the first two races of the laser competition. 49 sailors compete at once in Laser races. The duo of Pavle Costov and Petar Cupać are in 17th out of 20 after two races in the 49er competition. Tina Mihelić is in 13th in the Women’s laser radial competition after two races. In the star competition, the Lovrović duo is in 14th after 4 races.
Reminder: All events can be seen live or on replay here:
always a good day when we beat the serbs in a big sporting event.
JEBEMO VAM MAJKU CETNICKU!! NASOJ SRECI NEMA KRAJA CETNICI NAM LIZU JAJA
HRVATSKA 31
Oni less than 31
ZA DOM
13-9 Croatia over Serbia at halftime
I say since it doesn’t look like we’re going to kill it in the medal count, I think Team CSR needs to pull the strings to get an exclusive bikini pictorial and interview with Antonija Misura.
The site would probably get so much traffic, it would crash the servers! 😀