21/01/2021 12:24
‘Home of Volleyball’ next step after Team MKD secures second straight EuroVolley appearance
News from the National Federations
Skopje, North Macedonia, January 21, 2021. The Macedonian Volleyball family is living the dream again. After Team MKD secured their second straight participation in CEV EuroVolley, the red-and-yellow stars made the headlines, and social media was flooded with their photos, statements and exciting rallies from the qualifier held last week in Skopje. Macedonian Volleyball has reached new heights, with recognition of that historic achievement coming from all sides.
The Director of the Agency for Youth and Sports of the Republic of North Macedonia, Naumche Mojsovski, held a reception for the players and the representatives of the Volleyball Federation. In addition to sharing sincere congratulations, Mr Mojsovski expressed a desire for long-term cooperation to ensure the development of Volleyball in the small Balkan country.
“It is my pleasure to host these sports giants who deserve all the honours and applause. Our goal is to establish as many sports bases as possible, in order for our national team members to have a place where to stay and train continuously. This is something they deserve, we know that this is practice in Europe, and we have to start to follow that path as well. I hope for your cooperation, you will determine that base, you will say where it will be located, and the institution I lead, the Agency for Youth and Sports, will help this idea to become reality,” Mojsovski promised.
"Honestly, I must emphasise that we have had a wonderful cooperation with the Agency in the last three to four years. Yes, we need a Home of Volleyball, all other Federations have solved this issue, so we expect this year to build that home, because we deserve it, and it will be an even greater motivation for us to work and achieve top results,” said the President of the Volleyball Federation of North Macedonia Petar Jovanovski, who demanded equal treatment of the Volleyball players with the Macedonian football stars, who also qualified for the European Championship, and for that success received a state award.
TEAM MKD will play at CEV EuroVolley again, so the current expectations are different from those raised in 2019. Then, the red-and-yellow achieved two victories, the first, historic, over Belarus, and the second over eventual silver medal winners Slovenia. Now the appetite is growing knowing that on the way to their qualification, the hosts edged better-ranked Turkey in the process.
“We are happy for this success, it will be beneficial not only for us in the national team, but also for the development of Volleyball overall. We will not stop here, we will go to the CEV EuroVolley to raise the standards and achieve an even better result than at the previous continental championship,” said Macedonian outside spiker Vlado Milev.
“I want to thank the Volleyball Federation for organising a great tournament at a high level and providing us with the best possible conditions for the preparation. I also want to point out that we now have great generations of youngsters that we need to support, to be our worthy replacement when the current generation leaves the national team. I think we are on the right track to raise Volleyball to a higher level,” added middle blocker Risto Nikolov.
A success story continues, but the period for celebration will be relatively short, because TEAM MKD will resume activities in May, when the matches of the CEV European Silver League are due to take place. After three finals, the gold medal is a desired goal, and then CEV EuroVolley 2021 follows with a plan to be one step ahead of Ljubljana. Macedonian Volleyball has entered cycles of motives and hopes, and that for now is the basis for a promising future.
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