Piacenza, Italy, February 10, 2015. Copra Volley PIACENZA is preparing for one of the most important and decisive clashes of the season as the home match against Zenit KAZAN from the first leg of the Playoffs 12 in the 2015 CEV DenizBank Volleyball Champions League - Men is coming up this Thursday, February 12, at 20:30 local time at the Palabanca sports hall.
This game is expected to offer the fans of volleyball a challenge of high altitude, as the Russian battleship is very solid and composed of athletes of very high calibre, such as Matthew Anderson, Nikolay Apalikov and Maxim Mikhailov. The home fans in Piacenza are quite familiar with the Russian opponent. Last year Zenit KAZAN was the team that eliminated Copra in the Playoff 6 stage of the competition.
The team from Piacenza is clearly not in optimal condition before this match. Copra is going through a difficult period: last Sunday it suffered its sixth consecutive defeat, at the hands of Cucine Lube TREIA. Now the path for captain Hristo Zlatanov and his teammates is uphill, especially in the run for access to the Italian playoffs. At the same time, for Zenit the situation is very different, as the team from Kazan is positioned second in the standings of the Russian league, behind Belogorie BELGOROD. The Tatar squad is coming to the Champions League playoffs from Pool D with an impeccable record of six victories without leaving even a set to the opponents, so Copra expects the match on Thursday to be a real venture.
"I think it would be correct to say that Zenit KAZAN is the strongest team in the world at this time,” says Copra’s coach Andrea Radici. “And this must be only a stimulus for all those players who have never played in the playoffs of the Champions League and never faced such strong opponents. It is a great opportunity for many, if not all. In sports, there is always room for surprises. We know that it will be an impossible task, but we also know that we have nothing to lose."
Click here for more details on the competition, including complete match schedule.