Serbia beat Russia 3-1 here on Friday to enter top four of the 2009 FIVB World League as Pool E winner.

Having posted a 2-0 win-loss record in the pool play, Serbia will meet Cuba, second finisher from Pool F, in Saturday's semifinals where Russia takes on seven-time title holder Brazil.

It was a hotly contested match from the very beginning while Russia managed to hold a narrow lead until Serbia staged an 8-3 run capped by two Russian errors to go up at 22-20.

Russia pulled within 23-22, but Ivan Miljkovic came up with a couple of strikes from the side to clinch the opener for Serbia.

Russia came back strongly in the second set with consecutive stuffs against Miljkovic pushing them up to 7-4, but they just couldn't hold on. Serbia steadily levelled it at 12-all and went on to overtake the lead at 18-16 after scoring four unanswered points.

A fighting Russian team pulled it back at 20-all and forced ties three more times, only to find Nikola Grbic give Serbia the edge again with a smart play and Evgeny Sivozhelez drive the ball long to surrender the set.

In the third set, Serbia rallied from 13-7 down to tie it 23-all, but this time the Russians did not let the chance slip away. After an Nikola Kovacevic error gave them the set point, Maxim Mikhaylov converted on it as he hit the ball off the block out of bounds to level one set back for Russia.

Russia stayed within 20-19 in the fourth set, but Serbia ran off five of the last seven points of the match which was terminated by Miljkovic with a short dink.

(Xinhua News Agency July 25, 2009)