17/04/2015 11:28
Kosheleva’s mind-boggling 245 points top European Cup scorers’ charts
2015 European Cups
Luxembourg, April 17, 2015. The 2015 European Cup season has provided once more all Volleyball fans with a series of world-class matches and with mind-boggling performances by some of the world’s best players. As we draw the line after as many as 504 matches were played since late October through mid-April, it is interesting to take a closer look at some more figures. A question that fans may come up is: who was the most prolific player across all six European competitions? The answer is there: Tatiana Kosheleva of Dinamo KRASNODAR scored 245 points as she anchored her team to their second European trophy in the last three seasons.
Kosheleva, who is also a member of Russia’s national team, accounted for 5.98 points per set and she definitely was one of the keys to Dinamo’s success in the 2015 edition of the CEV Volleyball Cup – Women. The Most Valuable Player from the 2013 CEV Volleyball European Championship received this accolade once more after totalling 37 points in the re-match with Poland’s PGE Atom Trefl SOPOT, thereby following up on the 20 she had chartered at home a few days earlier.
Only three more players have hit the 200-mark in this year’s European Cups: Valentina Diouf (211), Nataliya Goncharova-Obmochaeva (205), and Olesia Rykhliuk (201). Actually both Goncharova and Rykhliuk did not make the Final Four tournament of the 2015 CEV DenizBank Volleyball Champions League – Women with their respective teams – Dinamo MOSCOW and Volero ZÜRICH – so their performance is even more remarkable since they contested two matches less than Diouf.
Moving to the men’s competitions, the Bulgarian-born opposite of Halkbank ANKARA, Tsvetan Sokolov, tops the charts on 199 points and is followed by the eventual gold medallist and MVP of the Final Four tournament, Wilfredo Leon Venero (189) of Zenit KAZAN. Matey Kaziyski completes this virtual podium after recording 183 points for Italy’s Energy T.I. Diatec TRENTINO that had to be content with silver in the CEV Volleyball Cup after a dramatic final match with Russia’s Dinamo MOSCOW.
Though it is always difficult to make comparisons across different competitions, another couple of interesting figures deal with the number of aces scored throughout the 2015 European Cup season. Matey Kaziyski tops the men’s standings on 34, closely followed by Leon with 33, whilst the Korean superstar of Fenerbahce Grundig ISTANBUL, Kim Yeon-Koung, recorded 30 and is unrivalled in the women’s European Cups. Matey Kaziyski scored 8 aces in the return semi-final match with Poland’s Zaksa KEDZIERZYN-KOZLE and this outstanding performance is documented in a nice video clip available right here.
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