Trento, 05 October 2024

Sunday’s seasonal home debut in SuperLega: guide to Itas Trentino-Gioiella Taranto

This weekend marks the second round of the regular season of SuperLega Credem Banca 2024/25. For Itas Trentino, Sunday, October 6, will be the moment of their home debut for the season: at the ilT quotidiano Arena in Trento, the European Champions will host Gioiella Prisma Taranto in the only top-tier clash scheduled for the entire day. Starting time is set for 5 PM, with live commentary on Radio Dolomiti and live streaming on VBTV.
HERE ITAS TRENTINO Just over five months since their last home game (April 24 against Milan), the yellow-blue team returns to play an official match in their own arena, aiming to continue their positive start to the championship, which began last Sunday in Cisterna di Latina with a 3-1 comeback victory.
“The vivid memory of the very tough home game last season and the result achieved in the debut against Milan already make us understand how Sunday’s match against Taranto is an appointment to be approached with caution,” explained coach Fabio Soli while presenting the challenge. “Gioiella Prisma is a well-built team, combining the experience of seasoned players like Zimmermann, Alletti, Lanza, and Rizzo with the physicality and enthusiasm of others who are playing as starters at this level for the first time. Therefore, it will be necessary to approach the match with intensity and focus, and it will be crucial to contain two key aspects like serving and attacking, where the Apulians have their strengths. We will finally be able to enjoy the support of our audience; learning from the experience of last Sunday in Cisterna di Latina, we will need patience, humility, and the awareness that what we are facing daily is a growth process that necessarily involves matches like these, where the difficulties posed by the quality of the opponent and our current form, still to be improved, will not be lacking.”
The coach of Itas Trentino should be able to reintegrate opposite hitter Kamil Rychlicki into the list of fourteen players on the roster, who has progressively started working with the group in recent days. In nineteen out of twenty-four previous seasons of the top national championship, the men’s team of Trentino Volley has won the first home game: the only five defeats are related to the seasons 2004/05 (Trento-Perugia 1-3), 2006/07 (Trento-Taranto 2-3), 2012/13 (Trento-Vibo 1-3), 2017/18 (Trento-Milan 2-3), and 2020/21 (Trento-Verona 0-3). Sunday’s match will be the 1,048th official match of the yellow-blue Club in the men’s sector, the 481st at home, where they have collected 379 victories so far in the regular season.
THE OPPONENTS The fourth consecutive season of SuperLega Credem Banca couldn’t have started better for Gioiella Prisma Taranto. Last Sunday’s home victory in three sets over Milan immediately provided three precious points for the standings and generated enthusiasm for the new era under Dante Boninfante. The former setter and Assistant Coach of Lorenzetti in Trento from 2017 to 2020, in his first match as head coach in the top league, presented a very aggressive team in serving and blocking, thanks to the characteristics of two players acquired from Piacenza like Gironi (opposite) and Alonso (middle blocker), but also through the experience of setter Zimmerman and Filippo Lanza. The Verona-born hitter, along with Wout D’Heer (making his debut as an ex-player, will be honored by Trentino Volley before the match), is the most anticipated player due to his past with the yellow-blue team: between 2006 and 2018, he won two Club World Championships, two Scudettos, two Italian Cups, one Super Cup, and one Junior League, totaling 300 appearances (150 as captain) and 2,877 personal points in the first team (he is still the second top scorer in the history of the yellow-blue team). The Belgian middle blocker has played 90 matches with Trento, scoring 215 points, and was one of the key players in winning the last three trophies for Itas Trentino: Super Cup 2021, Scudetto 2023, and Champions League 2024.
THE BACKGROUND During the regular season that has just begun Taranto will join Ravenna in 15th place in the list of opponents faced the most times by Trentino Volleyball in its history related to the men's team. Currently, the Apulian club boasts twenty previous matches, but will certainly play at least two matches during this season, equaling the Romagnola club at 22. The overall report is 13-7 for gialloblù, who have won eleven of their thirteen most recent matches, including the two from the last regular season: a 3-2 comeback win on October 28th, 2023 in Trent, and a 3-0 win last January 7th on the Ionian shore. At ilT quotidiano Arena these two teams have played together for a total of ten times, with eight wins by the locals and two by the guests (always at tie break: September 10th, 2006 and December 21st, 2008). Taranto's last victory against Trentino Volleyball was on March 22nd, 2009: at tie break in the match played at the Palasport Karol Wojtyla in Martina Franca.
THE REFEREES The match will be refereed by Andrea Puecher (from Rubano - Padova in Serie A since 2003 and international since 2014) and Angelo Santoro (from Varese, tenured referee since 2016), in his first ever absolute SuperLega Credem Banca regular season. Thus, the only one to boast previous official matches in Trento is Puecher, in his second season in the league, who refereed the gialloblù the last time on April 17th (home victory at tie break over Milan in game 1 of the Play Off Final 3rd place).
LEGAVOLLEY AWARD FOR MICHIELETTO The beginning of the match will be preceded by a particularly significant moment for one of the gialloblù’s top players: Alessandro Michieletto will receive the Volleyball Serie A League Award related to the 2023/24 championship, as the best spiker. It’s the second time in a row in this specific ranking.
RADIO, INTERNET AND TV The match will be reported live by Radio Dolomiti, Trentino Volley’s media partner. Frequencies to listen to the regional network are available on the website www.radiodolomiti.com, where it is also possible to follow the radio news live also in streaming. Also confirmed is live video streaming on OTT platform, "VBTV"; there is a fee for the service. For more information about its use see the website https://it.volleyballworld.com/volleyball-tv-it.
A summary of the match will be broadcast on Monday, October 7th at 9:50 p.m., on RTTR channel, Trentino Volleyball's media partner. Moreover, detailed updates will be managed by the website of the Volleyball League Serie A (www.legavolley.it) and www.trentinovolley.it itself, and always active on gialloblù social networks (www.trentinovolley.it/facebook, www.trentinovolley.it/instagram and www.trentinovolley.it/twitter).
TICKET OFFICE The match is included in the 2024/25 season ticket. Tickets for the single match can be purchased at any time on the internet by clicking https://trentinovolley.vivaticket.it/it/event/itas-trentino-taranto/247439
Tickets will also be available on Sunday at the ticket office of the ilT quotidiano Arena, active from 4 pm, at the same time as the entrances to the arena will also be opened.

Trentino Volley Srl
Press Office