Oleg Stoyanovskiy / Igor Velichko Russia (10) def. Daniele Lupo / Paolo Nicolai Italy (8) 21-18, 16-21, 20-18 (47)
Oleg Stoyanovskiy, Russia - “We tried to put away the pressure, free our minds and play our game and we managed. It’s the best tournament with the best 10 teams in the world. I think it’s been a great season for us, so far we have three medals, a spot in the Hamburg Finals. We made some progress during the year and now we believe we can win against some teams like Paolo and Dani. They are really good sportsmen.” (On the line call on match point that Lupo changed): “That was amazing. Thanks to Dani, he’s a great player.”
Paolo Nicolai, Italy - “We lost but I think Stoyanovskiy had an amazing third set with his serve. The most important thing is we played well, I think, and we advanced to the elimination. So it’s OK. Yes we were up in the point ratio and we knew that before the game and we knew which score we had to do. We are really focused on the next round. We are in the World Tour Finals and it’s normal that all the games are so close. We have to try to do our best because for sure we will play an amazing team so we have to push hard.”
Daniele Lupo, Italy - “It’s obviously disappointing not to win another match, but we know it was pool play and we are qualified. It was a good game and think we played well. Now we are looking forward to play in the elimination round.”