Al Arabi lost 3-0 (23-25, 17-25, 19-25) to their Iranian counterparts during an encounter that was a repeat of the last edition’s final.
Al Arabi had seen off Taichung Commercial Bank from Chinese Taipei in straight sets 3-0 (25-19, 25-22, 25-16) to advance to the semi-finals.
Sarmayeh Bank will now face Japan’s Toyoda Gosei Trefuerza in the final.
Croatian opposite spiker Igor Omrcen scored 33 points to steer the Japanese team past Kazakhstan’s Altay VC with a sensational straight-set victory 25-16,25-22,25-22 yesterday.
“It was an amazing game and a wonderful performance from my team. We fought very hard to the final round. I think we prepared and executed our tactics very well today. It is very nice job for us,” said Igor Omrcen, who joined Toyoda Gosei Trefuerza for four years.