Trento, 31 March 2021

Semifinal Play off Scudetto, on Thursday (at 20) at the BLM Group Arena match 2

Match 2 of Semifinal Play Off Scudetto SuperLega Credem Banca 2021 is played on Thursday first April at the BLM Group Arena. Itas Trentino will face Cucine Lube Civitanova, on 1-0 in the series that is played at the best of fifth matches. The kickoff is at 20: live on RAI Sport + and Radio Dolomiti.
HERE ITAS TRENTINO After the accomplishment of match 1, the gialloblù formation will try to maintain the field factor to make the double advantage and focus on the second part of the series with major possibilities to pass the round.
“The match of Sunday in Civitanova Marche showed that the two teams are very near as skills and so, few balls are inevitably needed to decide the result of every single match – said the coach Angelo Lorenzetti during the presentation of the match - . The satisfaction of having won at the tie break must not make us lose the real difficulty that involves facing a team like Cucine Lube. To be able to adequately counter it even in this second game, we must play a very intense volleyball with fewer pauses, and increase the quality of some fundamentals, first among everything the defence.”
The gialloblù team will finish the preparation with a technical-tactical session this afternoon and with the classic training on the morning of the match. Match 2 will be the 44th seasonal match for Trentino Volley, the 22nd at the BLM Group Arena, where, until now, it has won eighteen victories and doesn’t lose for four months (last KO is on 25 November with Vibo Valentia). For the gialloblù Company, it will be the 122nd match in its history in the Play Off Scudetto (report of 73 wins and 48 defeats), the 45° in semifinal, where it has 26 success and 18 KO.
THE OPPONENTS Cucine Lube Civitanova will go for the third time in this season to Trento with the goal of having the first victory in the last twelve months at the BLM Group Arena, where it hasn’t won since 13 February 2020 (match of Champions League). The home KO of last Sunday inverted the field factor and will force Blengini’s team to find necessary an away-success to make his team go to the fourth consecutive final Scudetto. The recovery of two important players such as Leal and De Cecco will certainly come to the aid of the Marche, who compared to race 1 were able to put some more training in their legs after having concluded the quarantine period. On the other hand, the conditions of the right hand of the great former Osmany Juantorena should be evaluated, who suffered a bruise during the fourth set of match 1.
THE PRECEDENTS Cucine Lube is the opponent faced several times by Trentino Volley in its history with 78 official matches in its history, five only in this season; the report is in favour of Lube for 43-35, also thanks to twenty-two victories in the latest twenty-seven matches. However, Lube has lost the most recent two matches, including the one of 14 December at the BLM Group Arena (3-0 for the gialloblù with partials of 25-22, 25-23, 25-22, and Nimir MVP). During Play Off Scudetto, the report is in favour of the hosts, being able to win in Trento three times in five matches overall. On the whole, Trentino Volley succeeded to make the field factor count in twenty-five of the thirty-four home matches played against Lube.
THE SERIES Itas Trentino goes to 1-0 in the series of Semifinal Play Off that is played at the best of fifth matches, thanks to the 2-3 on 28 March at the Eurosuole Forum in Civitanova with partials of 25-23, 21-25, 25-21, 24-26, 12-15. On Thursday, there is match 2, which could be the only one played at the BLM Group Arena, only in case of two other victories of the gialloblù team between this match and the following one (match 3) on Sunday 4 April in Marche (at 17 or 18.15). If Cucine Lube wins one of the next two matches, it will be necessary for match 4 that is played at the BLM Group Arena on Wednesday 7 April at 20.30. The one that passes the round will find in the Final (also at the best of fifth matches, it will start on 14 April) the winning team of Perugia-Monza, for which the Umbrians goes to 1-0 (this evening match 2 in Lombardy).
THE REFEREES The match will be directed by Armando Simbari (first referee from Milan) and Mauro Goitre, second referee from Turin. For Simbari, in Serie A since 2007 and international since 2016, it’s the tenth seasonal match in SuperLega; two of these are related to Trentino Volley: home defeat in three sets with Verona (4 October), and victory by 3-1 in Perugia (3 January). For Goitre, working since 2014, it’s the thirteenth seasonal direction in SuperLega; three of these are related to Trentino Volley: victory by 3-2 in Verona (6 December), victory in three sets with Milano at home, and defeat by 0-3 with Perugia in Bologna (30 January – semifinal of Italian Cup).
TV, RADIO AND INTERNET The match is a global event and will be live on tv, radio, and Internet. It will be broadcast live by RAI Sport +, channel present both on the digital terrestrial platform (number 57 in HD, 58 in SD) and on the Sky satellite platform at number 227, with the report by Maurizio Colantoni and Andrea Lucchetta; the game is also on streaming video-audio on the app RaiPlay.
Starting at 18, the match will have a full and live coverage by Radio Dolomiti, media partner of Trentino Volley. The frequencies can be found on www.radiodolomiti.com, where it will be possible to listen to the radio commentary in streaming at the section “On Air”.
On tv, the full match is broadcasted on Saturday 3 April at 21 on RTTR, tv partner of Trentino Volley.
On Internet, the point-by-point updates will be made by the website of Lega Pallavolo Serie A (www.legavolley.it) and by www.trentinovolley.it and they will be always active on the gialloblù Social Network
(www.trentinovolley.it/facebook, www.trentinovolley.it/instagram e www.trentinovolley.it/twitter).
BLM GROUP ARENA BEHIND CLOSED DOORS Following the ordinances in the latest Prime Ministerial Decree, the arena is closed to the public, allowing only a few accredited media and field staff to enter.

Trentino Volley Srl
Press Office