What a difference a day makes; at the end day of the third day of competition at the Liebherr World Team Championships in Moscow, the Belarus Men’s Team left the Olimpijsky Sports Complex with heads bowed in sadness; they had suffered a three-nil defeat at the hands of North Korea.

One day later, on Wednesday 26th May 2010, the heads were held high.

They had completed their group stage matches with an impressive three-one victory over fourth seeds, Hong Kong.

Earlier in the day they had excelled to beat Portugal by three matches to nil to give themselves hope, the dreams turned from hopes to reality.

The Austrian trio of Werner Schlager, Robert Gardos and Chen Weixing beat North Korea’s Ri Chol Guk, Kim Hyok Bong and Kim Nam Chol by three matches to nil whilst at the same time Portugal’s Tiago Apolonia, Marcos Freitas and Joao Monteiro posted a three-nil win against Singapore’s Yang Zi, Gao Ning and Cai Xiaoli.

At the end of proceedings Hong Kong topped the group with nine points followed by Austria, Portugal and Belarus all locked on eight points.

The end result on match ratio between the three teams saw Belarus clinch second spot ahead of Austria and Portugal; Hong Kong, Belarus and Austria therefore progress to compete for places one to 12 with Portugal joining North Korea and Singapore in the contest for places 13 to 24.

Portugal, who had given so much to the tournament and had won the nail-biting matches that thrilled the crowd, suffered a cruel end.

Against Hong Kong Vladimir Samsonov beat both Jiang Tianyi and Ko Lai Chak but the hero of the hour was Evgueni Chtchetinine, in the second contest of the fixture he defeated Ko Lai Chak.

Hong Kong recovered with Cheung Yuk defeating Pavel Platonov but with Vladimir Samsonov to follow, the win was pivotal.

“The result did not really matter for Hong Kong, whatever the outcome they would finish first in the group”, said Alexander Petkevitch, the Belarus Men’s Team Head Coach. “Evgueni was excellent, he has been in Minsk for a week before the tournament, practising really hard, today all the effort paid dividends.”

Evgueni Chtchetinine was outstanding and Vladimir Samsonov was a much more positive player than on the previous evening.

“I told him he must be really focused and try to stay closer to the table”, explained Alexander Petkevitch. “Also, I told him to play faster, to be positive.”

He obeyed the captain’s orders!

Sadness for Spain and there was more sadness for the Iberian Peninsula with Spain losing a full distance five match encounter against Japan.

It seemed at one stage that Spain might cause an upset. Jesus Cantero beat Kenta Matsudaira and Carlos Machado overcame Kaii Yoshida before Japanese the recovery began.

Kasuhiro Chan defeated Alfredo Carnos, Kenta Matsudaira overcame Carlos Machado with Kaii Yoshida bringing matters to an end with victory over jesus Cantero.

Germany finished in top place in the group with Japan second. Hungary and Spain ended level on seven points but as Hungary beat Spain earlier in matters, third place went Hungary.

Proceedings concluded in the group stage with Germany’s Patrick Baum, Bastian Steger and Christian Süss overcoming Hungary’s Adam Pattantyus, Daniel Kosiba and Ferenc Pazy by by three matches nil whilst Croatia’s Ivan Juzbasic, Andrej Gacina and Tomislav Kolarek inflicted the ame defeat on Denmark.

Ivan Juszbasic defeated Funn Tugwell, Andrei Gacina defeated Morten Rasmiussen whilst Tomislav Kolarek ended the aspirations of Christian Kongsgaard.

Croatia finished in fifth place with Denmark sixth.