As in the first leg, Montpellier was beaten by Toulouse in the Occitan derby

Avec 18 points, Ezequiel Palacios a été le meilleur montpelliérain du match Midi Libre – Michael Esdourrubailh

Four days before the quarter-final of the Coupe de France against Tours (Saturday at 8 p.m. in Castelnau), MHSC VB has conceded a second defeat in three matches.  

The Toulouse Spacer’s are clearly not doing well at MHSCVB this season. In the first leg in Castelnau-le-Lez, the Héraultais had to push their Occitan neighbours to the tie-break before finally losing (2-3).

This time, the Toulousains only needed four sets to win one of the regional derbies of the season. Despite a rather successful start to the match, Nicolas Le Goff and his partners suffered the lightning strikes of their opponents.

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Toulouse put on a show in a Palais des Sports filled with conquered supporters. It was therefore very logical that the locals took the lead at the end of a controlled first set (25-21).

A reaction in vain

Loic Le Marrec's men, who had the opportunity to take the lead alone in the event of success, reacted. Thanks to his block, one of the most effective in France (64 blocks in the last 5 matches, an average of 12.8 blocks per match), they sounded the revolt with six consecutive points (9-15). Argentinian captain Ezequiel Palacios dominated the game at this point in the match and helped his team equalise (16-25).

But, like the ineffectiveness of Bulgarian point guard Dimitar Dimitrov and the limitations of his replacement, Finnish Veikka Lindqvist, MHSC VB was in difficulty against the young Toulouse guard.

He made too many mistakes (15 in the 3rd set) and Toulouse hurt his reception. The locals broke away and won the set (25-19).

The fight continued in the fourth set. Joris Seddik and his team clung to the hope of pushing their opponent to the fifth set. But the money-time turned to the advantage of the home team (25-23).

By conceding a second defeat in three matches, the Héraultais did not prepare for their quarter-final of the Coupe de France in the best possible way. Tuesday at the Palais des sports de Castelnau (8 p.m.), for this clash against Tours, it will certainly be a different story.

Technical sheet

TOULOUSE 3
MONTPELLIER 1
Palais des sports de Toulouse
Set details: 25-21 (30’), 16-25 (24’), 25-19 (26’), 25-23 (34’)
Toulouse: 49 winning attacks, 8 aces, 3 blocks, 25 fouls. Picard (20), Feral (10), Petkov (9), Duflos-Rossi, Gill (3), Nack-Minyem (6) then Piazzeta, Hervoir. Libero: Santucci. Ent. Patrick Duflos.
Montpellier: 47 winning attacks, 4 aces, 13 blocks, 31 fouls. Corre (2), Seddik (12), Palacios (18), Le Goff (7), Lopez (8), Dimitrov then Coulet (2), Conré, Lindqvist (7), Spano. Libero: Phelut. Ent. : Loic Le Marrec.