the Brazilian middle-blocker of Diatec Trentino Eder Carbonera in attack position.
ph. Trabalza
Trento, December 4th 2017
2018 CEV Champions League is being set in motion. On Tuesday December 5th, indeed, the first match of the Main Phase is taking place. We're talking about the most important continental appointment for clubs and Trentino Volley is competing for it after skipping just one season. The team already stopped thinking about the glorious recovery after the match against Modena of Sunday and they are now focusing on the beginning of the tournament in Steengped Arena of Maaseik (Belgium), where they're playing against the home team Noliko the first match of Pool E. It is starting at 8:30pm (Italian hour): it will be broadcast live on Fox Sports, Radio Dolomiti and audio and video live streaming on the site www.laola1.tv.
HERE DIATEC TRENTINO One year after the Final of the 2016 edition played in Krakow, the yellow-blues is back in the CEV Champions League, in which they obtained great victories and lived unforgettable emotions in the past. Besides, history is repeating itself, since the first match of last time the team participated they also played against Noliko (that time in PalaTrento), and they won. This time they would need the same good start against one of the most valuable teams of the Playoffs 12. “We want to start the European tournament better then how we started the Italian Campionato” said the coach Angelo Lorenzetti “it's true that we don't have much time to get prepared for this important meeting, but it's also true that we're still under the adrenaline caused by the victory against Modena of Sunday night. If we want to win against Noliko the teams needs to perform good services and play well during the block phase, since Noliko has is great at the side-out phase and has a quick play”.
This morning Trentino Diatec left for Maaseik and they are arriving in there at lunch time after flying from Bergamo to Eindhoven and taking a bus till their destination; Angelo Lorenzetti took with him all the thirteen players of the team. This match will coincide with the debut in CEV Champions League for four yellow-blue players: Cavuto, Chiappa, Zingel and Eder.
THE STORY OF TRENTINO VOLLEY IN THE EUROPEAN CUPS: On Tuesday, in Belgium, Trentino Volley is starting its eighth participation in CEV Championship League and its twelfth in an European championship in general. The team won the tournament in 2009, 2010 and 2011, they ranked at third place in 2012, they arrived till the Playoffs 12 in 2013 and till Playoffs 6 in 2015. In 2016 the yellow-blues ranked at second place. During the season 2004/2005 Trentino Volley participated in the Top Team Cups, but didn't perform well (the team was eliminated by the Dutch team Ortec Nesselande Rotterdam in the preliminary phase played in PalaTrento), and also in the CEV Cup, but only arrived till the octo-finals, defeated by the Turkish team Halbank Ankara. During the last season and in 2015/2016 they ranked at second place in the CEV Cup (where they lost during the golden set first against Moscow and then against Tours).
In total Trentino Volley played 104 matches in European Cups, and won 85 of them. In CEV Champions League the balance sheet is even more comforting since the victories are 61 out of 74. The beginning of the championship has always been a good moment for the team: 3-0 in Bled on November 4th 2008, 3-2 in Athens against Olympiacos on December 2nd 2009, 3-2 against Friethedrichshafen on November 17th 2010, 3-0 against Teruel on October 20th 2011, 3-0 against Red Star Belgrade on October 25th 2012, 3-1 against Berlin on October 24th 2013 and 3-0 against Noliko on November 5th 2015.
SEVENTH AWAY MATCH OF TRENTINO VOLLEY IN BELGIUM: This morning the seventh away match of Trentino Volley in Belgium has started, and it will end on Wednesday December 6th , when the team is coming back in Trento, around 3:00pm. Trentino Volley has always won in this country before. The yellow-blues are getting ready to travel for the 5th time to Maaseik, where they already played on December 31st 2012, on Janaury 14th 2014 (in both occasions they where playing the first leg of Playoffs 12 of Champions League, in which they won 3-0 and 3-1), but also in January 26th 2016 (match won in 3 sets in the Pool C) and on February 17th 2016 (3-2 against Lennik in the first leg of Playoffs 12). Trentino Volley also played in other Belgian cities, such as Roeselare on February 17th 2010 (first leg of Playoffs 12 of Champions won 3-1) and on March 11th 2015 (3-2), return match of Challenge Round of CEV Cup. In total the team has already played 42 matches away from Trento in this competition, and they won 32 of them. The match against Noliko is 133th international match of the whole yellow-blue history.
THE OPPONENTS: Noliko Maaseik is one of the most prestigious and well known teams in Belgium, thanks to the amazing results that it obtained at in international level in the recent past. The team is now playing with the aim to recover from the many disappointments of last year, when they suffered from the great play of their historic opponents, Roeselare (who won both the champions and the cup). So their honour list hasn't improved during the last 12 months, but it is still very rich: 14 pennants, 14 Belgian Cups, 14 national SuperCups, best figures of their country.
The one of Tuesday will be the 23rd participation at Champions League, in which in two occasion it ranked 2nd, letting win an Italian team in both situation, Modena in 1997 and Treviso in 1999. In last edition his race already finished in the pool phase due tu the last place achieved in Pool A which included Kedzierzyn-Kozle but also Dinamo Mosca and Istanbul.
Compared to the past, the pinks of the red and black team has been renewed, Joel Banks, has been promoted first coach after two seasons of apprenticeship with Castellani.
The high-profile players are the Dutch spiker Man (at his ten season in a row in Maaseik), who diagonally plays with the Argentine Bruno (ex Ortona in Series A2); in pink also the ex middle blocker of Modena Sighinolfi, the Estonian Tammemaa and the Slovenian Mijatovic. It qualified in the pool phase overcoming the third turn with double success over Groningen. In the Liga Belga has achieved seven victories in nine matches (the last one on Saturday night for 3-1 in Leuven) which have allowed to be at a point away from the first on the chart. The pink of Noliko Maaseik: 1. Jolan Cox (o), 2. Sebastien Dumont (l), 3. Michiel Ahyi (s), 4. Timo Tammemaa (c), 5. Jelte Maan (s), 6. Just Dronkers (l), 9. Jay Michael Blankenau (p), 10. Nicolas Bruno (s), 11. Kamil Rychlicki (s), 12. Stef Van Heyste (p), 13. Sebastian Gevert (o), 16. Berre Peters (s), 17. Dane Mijatovic (c), 18. Nicholas Sighinolfi (c). Coach Joel Banks.
THE STRUCTURE The match opens the Main Phase of 2018 CEV Champions League; after the first two preliminary turns, the tournament enters in the pool phase dividing the 20 teams in 5 Pool in 4 each which will face each other in an Italian round.
In the Main Phase the points will be assigned according to the Italian system: 3 for the victories in 4 sets and 2 in the case of a victory in the tie break (1 point goes to the team defeated team)
At the end of this phase (the last match is scheduled for February 28th 2018) the first two classified in every Pool and the best two third will proceed to the final eight, which will be characterized by direct matches. The Final Four will be on May 12nd - 13rd 2018 (place still to define). In the same Pool, Wednesday on Turkey there will be the match between Izmir and Zaksa Kiedzierzyn-Kozle as well (next opponents of Trentino Diatec on December 20 in Poland).
THE PREVIOUS With the match of tomorrow night the matches between the two Societies will be seven, which has already played in the Playoffs 12 in 2012 and 2014 edition of CEV Champions League and in the Pool Phase (Pool C) in 2016 edition.
Statistics are in favour of Trentino, capable of concede his opponents just three sets in the match of January 31st 2012 (3-0 in Belgium), on February 8th 2012 (3-1 at PalaTrento), on January 14th 2014 (3-1 at Lotto Domo of Maaseik), on January 22nd 2014 (3-1 at PalaTrento), on November 5th 2015 (3-0 at PalaTrento) and the last one on January 26th 2016 (3-0 in Maaseik). Statistics with Belgium teams talk only about victories, bearing in mind the 4 victories over Roeselare in Playoffs 12 in 2010 edition of the tournament (double 3-1) and the Challenge Round of 2015 CEV Cup (double 3-2) and the two ones over Lennik (3-2 and 3-0) in the Playoffs 12 of Champions 2016.
THE REFEREES The team will be refereed by the Russian Evgeny Makshanov, first referee resident in St. Petersburg and by the Dutch Jacobus Nederhoed, second whistle of Ylst. Both of them have already worked with Trentino Volley; Makshanov refereed Kedzierzyn-Kozle-Trento 1-3 of November 21st 2012, while Nederhoed refereed Friedrichshafen-Trento 3-2 of January 11 (match of Pool D), Trento-Belgorod 0-3 of February 13rd 2014 (Playoffs 6) and Lennik-Trento 2-3 of February 17th 2016, last yellow-blue match in Maaseik.
TV, RADIO AND INTERNET The match will be broadcast in live tv on Fox Sports, available on Sky at channel 204. The play-by-play by Roberto Prini and Samuele Papi.
The live commentary of Radio Dolomiti, Trentino Volley partner, will be at 20:25. On www.radiodolomiti.com are all the regional network frequencies and at the same time, the live streaming in the section “On air”.
www.laola1.tv will broadcast the live streaming of the match, to watch the matches you’ll have to login in the section of CEV Champions League (at http://www.laola1.tv/en-int/channel/volleyball-cev-champions-league-men-livestream-video-for-free) and click on the red icon “live”.
The point to point report will be lavabile on the official website of CEV at http://cevlive.cev.lu/DV_LiveScore.aspx?ID=30848 . All updates will be available on www.trentinovolley.it and on yellow-blues Social Network (www.trentinovolley.it/facebook and www.trentinovolley.it/twitter).
Trentino Volley Srl
Press Office
