SEOUL, June 16 (Xinhua) -- Gabriele Maruotti scored team-high 17 points to help Italy defeat China 3-1 at the 2018 FIVB Volleyball Nations League, racking up its 500th victory at international tournament.
Italy won the first two sets 25-23, 25-21 and China came back to have the third set 25-19. But Chinese players' errors in the fourth set cost them the game, giving the set away 25-17.
Jiang Chuan scored the game-high 19 points for China as Liu Libin added 12. Gabriele Nelli added 16 and Enrico Cester had 10 for Italy.
Italy coach Blengini Gianlorenzo gave credit to his players in the victory.
"Our service and defense were good. We started making mistakes from the third set as we missed five serves in a row in the beginning, but we continue to push on and extended our momentum to have the win as our play performed at their best later," said Gianlorenzo.
"With the attack, block and defense, they were better than us. Our performance today was not enough to beat a team like Italy," China coach Raul Lozano said.
