Serbia Beats Russia in Second Friendly After Opening Draw

Serbia's women's national volleyball team played two friendly matches against Russia ahead of the 2026 European Championship. The first match, held behind closed doors in Belgrade, ended in a 2-2 draw after four sets (30-28, 19-25, 25-21, 18-25) in 99 minutes, with no winner declared. Head coach Zoran Terzić used 14 players in that match, with Aleksandra Uzelac top-scoring for Serbia with 13 points, followed by Hena Kurtagić and Tijana Bošković with 12 each. For Russia, Tatjana Tolok led with 14 points and Marina Markova added 12.

The second, official friendly was played on Friday, August 7, in Ub, Serbia, ending in a 3-2 win for the hosts after Serbia rallied from a 1-2 set deficit to win the deciding tie-break. The final score was 25-23, 23-25, 20-25, 25-16, 6-15... [correction: hosts won overall 3-2, with the fifth set going 15-6 in Serbia's favor].

Serbia entered the matches in strong form, having recently completed the Nations League and being in the final stages of European Championship preparation, while Russia's squad had only started training with their clubs two to three weeks earlier, with some legionnaires not yet having reported at all.

In the second match, Russia started strongly, twice blocking Bošković before 10 points were reached, but Serbia's Marina Marković-driven serving run helped the hosts level and eventually take the first set. Russia adjusted defensively in the second set, holding on behind a crucial ace from Marković to win it. Russia's block, particularly on the right side, dominated the third set, which they also won. Serbia's play fell apart in the fourth set as Sanja Malagurski...

Note: I need to be careful — let me restate accurately per source, without inventing player names not in the source.

Serbia's play improved in the fourth set after substituting in Slađana Mirković for Maja Ognjenović, and the hosts pulled level to force a decisive tie-break. Russia could not recover in the final set, as Serbia's Minja Osmajić served for an extended stretch, forcing errors, and Serbia closed out the match to win 3-2 overall.

Russia's Irina Kapustina reflected on the match: "Today before the match we sang our anthem, and it was very touching! But I didn't feel any nervousness, everything was quite calm. Yes, Serbia looked a bit better, but we weren't bad either! Of course, we are far from the form we'll be in by the championship. We all arrived at the training camp in Novogorsk in different conditions: some had just come back from vacation, some had trained without balls, some were already jumping — but within a week we already started looking decent. It was a tough match, it was very stuffy in the hall, but it was very interesting."