Greece have steamed past Serbia to book themselves a spot in the men’s water polo final at the World Aquatics Championships in Japan.
Avenging their loss to the Serbians in the final at the Olympics two years ago, it was a dominant performance from the Greeks, who controlled the match to come out 13-7 winners.
Setting the tone early, they lead 3-2 in the first before a dominant second quarter saw them up 6-2 at half time. From then on it was smooth sailing, scoring seven more goals in the second half.
Four different players scored multiple goals, with Konstantinos Kakaris and Stylianos Argyropoulos both scoring hat tricks.
It was an impressive display, with Greece head coach Theodoros Vlachos downplaying the ‘easiness’ of the win, saying they prepared for a hard battle against the reigning two-time Olympic champions.
“First of all, we were ready for a tough game because Serbia played excellent against Italy and I was expecting a very tough game, but in the water our players defended and also in attack we had many solutions,” he said.
“We didn’t give Serbia a chance to close the difference during the game. Everybody believes that this was an easy game, but there is no such a thing as an easy game in the semi-finals of World Aquatics Championships. I think we tried a lot and I hope we can do it for one more game.”
It was a stark contrast to their quarter-final game against Montenegro, where Greece scored in the last two seconds to win 10-9.
Having also won all their group stage matches against USA, Australia and Kazakhstan, beating the latter 18-2, Greece have been in tremendous form.
Greece are now eying history, with the opportunity to win the men’s water polo world title for the first time ever.
They are now locked in to record their highest-ever finish with a silver medal guaranteed. They have previously won three bronze medals, but did win silver at the Tokyo Olympics in the final loss to Serbia.
An Olympic spot at Paris is now locked away for Greece and their final opponent on Saturday, Hungary.
Hungary won a thrilling 12-11 game against Italy to book a spot in the final.
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