World Championships: Four Euro Teams Prevail to Set Up Olympic Semifinal Rematches
Four European teams prevailed in the men’s water polo crossover round of the 2025 World Championships, setting up replays of both Paris Olympic semifinals in the Worlds quarters on Sunday.
Serbia beat Japan, 21-14, to advance to a quarterfinal against Group C winner United States. Serbia beat the U.S., 10-6, in the semifinals in Paris on the way to gold.
Hungary survived a scare from Romania for a 15-11 win on Friday. That sets the Hungarians up against Group D winner Croatia; Croatia beat Hungary, 9-8, in the Olympic semis.
Both teams from Group D won in the crossover round. Runner-up Montenegro routed Canada, 22-10. Greece, which finished third in the group, bested Brazil, 17-5. Greece will take on Group A winner Italy in the first quarterfinal Sunday, while Montenegro takes on Group B winner Spain.
The crossover round losers fall into the 9-12 classification matches.
Romania got within two goals in the fourth quarter, but Hungary held off its rally. Gergely Burian was 3-for-3 shooting with three assists. Daniel Angyal, Adam Nagy, Peter Kovacs and Zsombor Vismeg tallied two goals apiece.
Vlad Georgescu led Romania with five goals. Andrei Neamtu paired three goals with two assists.
Serbia used nine goals in the third quarter to pull away from Japan. Boris Vapenski led the way with four goals and two assists. Milos Cuk and Djordje Lazic scored three goals each, Cuk adding two assists. Nikola Jaksic had a goal and five assists. Radoslav Filipovic stopped 11 shots in goal.
Taiyo Watanabe and Toi Suzuki had three goals and two assists each. Yusuke Inaba added three goals and an assist.
Emmanouil Andreadis stopped seven shots as Greece kept a first-half zero, leading 7-0 and never looking back. Konstantinos Genidounias paired three goals with three assists. Aristeidis Chalyvopoulos poured in three goals. Greece had eight blocks and eight steals, holding Brazil to 1-for-16 on action shots.
A 5-0 margin in the second quarter helped Montenegro pull away from Canada. Filip Gardasevic orchestrated the attack with five goals and three assists. Savo Cetkovic shot 4-for-4. Dmitri Kholod (two goals, three assists) and Strahinja Gojkovic (three goals, two assists) had five points apiece.
Reuel Mark D’Souza and Jason O’Donnell (on 3-for-3 shooting) tallied hat tricks for Canada.
