Plovdiv / Varna, Bulgaria, September 2, 2016. On Thursday afternoon the rosters of the teams participating in the 2016 CEV U20 Volleyball European Championship - Men's finals became officially known and on Friday it is already game day! This afternoon the first whistle of the tournament in Bulgaria will sound and the battles for the 25th U20 men’s continental title will get underway in Plovdiv and Varna.
The top nine teams from the final standings at the 2015 CEV U19 Volleyball European Championship in Sakarya and Kocaeli have made it among the current finalists in Plovdiv and Varna, which already is a sign that these young volleyballers on the rise have reached a certain level of consistency in their performance and the tournament in Bulgaria is about to be a very exciting one.
When speaking to the media on the day before the start of the competition, most of the coaches pointed to Poland as the favourites to win this championship. The young squad of coach Sebastian Pawlik are not simply following the path that the previous generation of Polish junior players paved by claiming the silver medals in Brno two years ago, but are likely to step it up, especially after they won last year’s U19 European Championship in Turkey. Eight of the heroes from Sakarya are on the 12-strong squad for the games in Plovdiv and already know how it gets done.
The Most Valuable Player of the 2015 championship in Turkey Bartosz Kwolek will once again be wearing the Polish jersey with #2, but it is worth noting that the Best Setter of that tournament, Kamil Droszynski, who was also on the 2014 U20 squad, is not on Pawlik’s squad this time. However, another person, who was on the 2014 U20 roster, and not only that, but earned the Best Receiver award in Brno – Tomasz Fornal – will play again in Plovdiv.
Poland will open the stage for the Pool I matches at the Kolodruma hall in Plovdiv on Friday afternoon at 15:00 local time with a game against France. If the current generation of French junior players want to at least repeat the bronze success of their predecessors at the 2014 U20 European Championship in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, they will have to step up their effort from last year’s U19 finals in Turkey, when they failed to make it among the top eight on the final standings.
Hosts Bulgaria will take on the court at the Kolodruma for the second Pool I match. With a new coach – Vladimir Nikolov who will be making his official debut in his new career - and only 50% overlap with the team that reached the sixth place in Sakarya, the young Lions are hoping the home court advantage and the support of the Bulgarian fans will boost their chances of making it among the medallists.
Ukraine are their first opponents. The Ukrainians are one of the teams that did not play at either of the continental championships in the past two years. They were among the last to qualify for this tournament and to a certain extent may be considered the underdogs in Pool I. On the other hand, this status may always be used as an advantage and anyone who discounts the team of coach Mykola Pasazhin may be up for an unpleasant upset.
While it is not quite correct to talk about underdogs, when it comes to the finalists at a continental forum, the other Pool I team that might be conditionally considered as such is Slovenia. The young players of coach Samo Miklavc are certainly looking up to their senior compatriots who claimed the 2015 European men’s silver, also in Bulgaria, as well as to the previous generation of junior players who made it to the semis in Brno two years ago, but to get closer to these achievements they should do much better than they did as a youth team, when they did not manage to qualify for the finals in Turkey.
The Slovenes face a tough start of the tournament as they meet Germany in the last Pool I match of the first competition day. Although the Germans secured a spot at the finals in Bulgaria only through the last round of qualifications, they arrive in Plovdiv with the self-confidence of 2015 U19 semifinalists. Despite a different coach, the German delegation arrived in Bulgaria with nine of the twelve players, who claimed the fourth place in Sakarya. Among them is the Best Scorer of last year’s European Championship – Maximilian Auste.
Pool II in Varna will have an exciting opening with a head-to-head clash between Balkan powers Turkey and Serbia. The Turkish squad that claimed the bronze medals at home last year represent a country whose Volleyball school has recently become a dominant power at under-age Balkan championships in both genders. Similar to Germany, the Turks came to Bulgaria with a different coach, but with eight players from the 2015 squad, including Abdullah Cam, who earned the Best Spiker award in Sakarya, as well as the Best Receiver Burak Cevik.
The Serbs finished eighth in Turkey last year. So did their predecessors in the Czech Republic and Slovakia two years ago. While this may be less than what the Balkan country normally expects from its Volleyball representations, the young players of coach Vladimir Vasovic have yet another chance for continental honours, following on the fantastic recent, as well as not-so-recent, achievements of Serbia’s senior teams.
The Russians, who finished fifth in Turkey, are certainly eager to step it up at the championship in Bulgaria. As successors of the most successful nation in the history of this competition and in Volleyball in general, the players of coach Mikhail Nikolaev must be feeling an obligation to claim one of the top two spots in Pool II and then go for the medals. Furthermore, Russia are the defending U20 European champions after claiming the 2014 title in Brno (see the photo). Nikolaev is relying on only six of the twelve players who performed at the U19 finals last year, but the tournament’s Best Blocker Aleksei Kononov is among them.
Neighbouring Belarus are Russia’s first opponents. Similar to their other common neighbours Ukraine, the Belarusians did not play at either of the continental championships in the past two years and may be considered the pool underdogs. Still, their coach Uladzimir Maisyevich believes his squad stands a chance against Russia. Indeed, the absence of a must-win pressure could prove to be a solid advantage.
The first competition day in Varna will finish with a match between the Czech Republic and Italy, which means a duel between the Best Server and the Best Libero of the U19 European Championship in 2015. The Italians arrived in Bulgaria as silver medallists from the tournament in Turkey. Libero Alessandro Piccinelli, who claimed one of the individual honours in Sakarya, is one of the seven players from that squad who will perform again in Varna. The only two defeats Italy suffered at the 2015 tournament were against Poland, so now the Azzurrini are hoping for a chance to take revenge from the Poles next week in Plovdiv.
The Czechs have made very few changes to the squad that finished seventh in Sakarya. As many as ten of those players are on coach Ivan Pelikan’s roster for Varna. The Best Server of the U19 European Championship in 2015, Matej Smidl, is once against expected to give the opposition’s receivers a lot of hard time, but, interestingly, the team of Czechia will not be relying on one of the country’s best young attackers recently - Donovan Dzavoronok, who was already on the junior national team two years ago for the U20 championship at home in Brno and has since joined the ranks of the senior men’s national team.
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