Trento, 16 January 2024

On Wednesday at ilT quotidiano Arena closes Pool B of the 2024 CEV Champions League

The 2024 CEV Champions League will experience the last round of the group stage on Wednesday, January 17th. On this occasion, Trentino Itas will play its third continental engagement of the season within the friendly walls of the ilT quotidiano Arena, hosting the Poles of Asseco Resovia Rzeszow: day six of Pool B. Kick-off scheduled for 8:30 p.m. Italian time: live on Radio Dolomiti and DAZN.
HERE TRENTINO ITAS Still with a full score and already certain of finishing the round in first place, a result that guaranteed direct access to the quarterfinals, the Italian Champion team is looking for another positive result to end the first phase with the best possible score and thus be able to enter an easier part of the table on paper, given that the definition of the Playoffs grid is made taking into account the ranking of all the qualifiers. Currently Trento is the best of the first ones and would remain so by winning the match with any score.
"The beauty and the difficulty of this competition is that there are no predictable matches, because the access criteria to the Playoffs table impose even to the teams already qualified for the quarters, like ours, to always and in any case seek the best possible result - underlined coach Fabio Soli presenting the match - . Beyond the ranking logics, we want to offer another high-level performance to continue our growth process and to consolidate the certainties of the game that we showed in the first five European matches of our season. Resovia is a very good team, which has a very high individual quality and can still qualify for the Playoffs: I am sure they will take the court to give their best, as they did in the first match".
The Yellow-blue will attend the appointment in full; the preparation for the appointment will be completed with this afternoon's and Wednesday morning's training sessions at the ilT quotidiano Arena. For Trentino Volley it will be the 169th official match in the European cups: the balance is of 134 victories (68 in Trento, 66 away) and 34 defeats (28 in the Champions League, 5 in CEV and 1 in the Top Teams Cup). The most frequently obtained result is the 3-0, resorted to in 48% of the cases (81 matches, 48 of them home); the one that has occurred the least number of times is the 0-3 defeat (eight times). Taking into account also the ten participations in the World Club Championship (between 2009 and 2014 and then in 2016, 2018 and 2021), the number of international matches played by the club from via Trener is 214: 135 away, 79 in Trento.
THE OPPONENTS Asseco Resovia Rzeszow comes to Trento, fourteen years after the last and only previous match, with the aim of winning the match in four sets at the most, in order to keep on hoping for the qualification to the round of 16, which would only come in case of second place in Pool B (a very remote hypothesis) or in case they would be the best third player among all the five groups of the Main Phase. The season's run in the CEV Champions League, in which it returned to participate after six seasons of absence thanks to the third place obtained in the Play Off Scudetto 2023 (following the first place in the regular season), was marked only by two victories with Ljubljana (both in three sets) and by some missed opportunities, especially in the other two home matches played.
The Red and White's palmares counts seven Polish titles, three National Cups and a Supercup (won in 2013, the last great success), but in the past, although not winning anything else, the Polish club has often achieved prestigious placings also at international level, as shown by the silver medals in the 1973 (it was defeated by CSKA Moscow) and 2015 (folded by Kazan) Champions Cups and in the 1973 Club World Cup, an event in which in 2018 it also achieved fourth place. Among the many important names on the roster entrusted to Giampaolo Medei (former coach of Civitanova in the two-year period 2017-2018) stand out those of the Slovenian outside hitterCebulj (formerly with Trento in the 2019/20 season), the libero Zatorski (formerly with Belchatow and Zaksa), the middle blocker Kochanowski, Rejno (both formerly with Kedzierzyn-Kozle) and Klos and two other hammers: American Defalco (former Vibo) and Frenchman Louati (former Padova and Monza). In the PlusLiga, after sixteen rounds, they are in fourth place in the standings with 35 points, the result of thirteen victories: the last one on Saturday night, at home to Warsaw, third in the class. The Asseco Resovia Rzeszow roster: 1. Jonas Kvalen (sp), 3. Michal Kedzierski (st), 4. Krzysztof Rejno (mb), 5. Jakub Bucki (o), 6. Karol Klos, 7. Jakub Kochanowski (mb), 8. Adrian Staszewski (sp), 9. Stephen Boyer (o), 11. Fabian Drzyzga (st), 13. Michal Poter (l), 14. Yacine Louati (sp), 16. Pawel Zatorski (l), 17. Bartlomiej Mordyl (mb), 18. Klemen Cebulj (sp), 59. Torey Defalco (sp), 91. Jakub Dopart (st), 92. Konrad Szapakowski (mb), 93. Bartosz Zych (sp), 94. Milosz Wrobel (mb). coach Giampaolo Medei.
THE SITUATION OF POOL B Thanks to five victories in as many matches played, Trentino Itas has already mathematically conquered the first place in the group, just as ACH Volley Ljubljana is already certain of its last place (and of the consequent end of its European season), having always lost. At stake is still the second place, which qualifies for the round of 16 and which is currently occupied by Tours, who only need to win two sets in Wednesday night's match at home with Ljubljana to secure that position, having one victory and three points more than Rzeszow. The team that finishes third is likely to advance to the CEV Cup, should it not be the best third in the five-day series (in which case it would also qualify for the round of 16).
BACKGROUND Trentino Volleyball and Asseco Resovia have already played four official matches, the first two referring to the 2010 edition of the CEV Champions League: in the then Playoffs 6 the Yellow-blue won both the home first match on 3 March 2010 (3-0) and the return match in Poland six days later (3-1). The most recent encounter was in the first match, won by the Yellow-blue in three sets (25-21, 26-24, 25-20 and Lavia mvp) in an away match on December 13th; also on file in Rzeszow is the match of the first phase of the 2018 Club World Cup, played on 29 November 2018 and won 3-0 by the Yellow-blue with scores of 24-26, 23-25, 20-25. In total, the official matches played against Polish teams by Trentino Volleyball are twenty-six, also taking into account the fourteen against Kedzierzyn-Kozle, the four matches against Belchatow and the two against Czestochowa and Jastrzebski; 19-7 for the Yellow-blue.
THE REFEREES The match will be refereed by Serb Aleksandar Petrovic, from Uzice, and Dutchman Marcon Van Zanten, from Vlaardingen. Both have only one previous meeting with Trentino Volley; Petrovic refereed the Yellow-blue in their 3-0 home win over Jihostroj Ceske Budejovice (Champions League group stage, 19 December 2019), while Van Zanten directed ENERGY T.I. Diatec Trentino-Vojvodina Ns Seme Novi Sad 3-0 on 19 November 2014 (CEV Cup round of 16 and the 100th international match in Yellow-blue history).
RADIO AND INTERNET  The match will be broadcast live on Radio Dolomiti, Trentino Volleyball's radio partner, starting at 20.30. The frequencies to tune in to the regional network can be found at www.radiodolomiti.com, where it will also be possible to listen to the live radio commentary in streaming.
Live video streaming will also be available on DAZN, a platform available on a wide range of Internet-connected devices, including Smart TVs, PCs, smartphones, tablets and game consoles. Paid service, which requires registration; for more information www.dazn.com/it-IT/help.
Point-to-point updates will be provided by the CEV website (https://www.cev.eu/match-centres/2024-european-cups/cev-champions-league-volley-2024-men/clvm-53-trentino-itas-v-asseco-resovia-rzeszow/), by www.trentinovolley.it and will also be active on the Yellow-blue social networks (www.trentinovolley.it/facebook, www.trentinovolley.it/instagram and www.trentinovolley.it/twitter).
TICKETING The match is included in both types of season tickets offered for this season by Trentino Volley (full and basic). Tickets for the single match can be purchased at any time on the internet by clicking https://trentinovolley.vivaticket.it/it/event/champions-league-2024-trentino-itas-vs-resovia/228056. The coupons will also be available on Thursday at the cash desks of the Palazzetto, which will be open from 7.30 pm (the same time at which the Palazzetto entrances will also open).

Trentino Volley Srl
Press Office