Volleyball
The stars of the Russian national team enchant in the Champions League. Only two steps to the title!
Arina Fedorovtseva / Photo: © Mariusz Palczynski / Mpaimages.C / Keystone Press Agency / Global Look Press
A promising end to the season for our volleyball players and the coach of the national team.
Last spring, after a long pause, the Russian women’s volleyball team received a new head coach. The eminent Zoran Terzic led the team, despite the difficult situation around our athletes in the international arena.
And although girls still cannot defend the colors of the national team, Russians continue to delight Europe.
Together with the head coach of the national team, they have already smashed the finalist of the last Champions League. It will get even hotter.
Two steps to victory
The brightest victories of our team are always associated with star volleyball players. Elena Godina, Lyubov Sokolova, Ekaterina Gamova, Tatyana Kosheleva – these girls are associated with the team’s success in the 21st century.
The last gold tournament happened in 2015, when Yuri Marichev’s team won the European Championship for the second time in a row. After that, there was a long pause, but in 2019 our girls managed to win a medal after four years of failure – this happened at the World Cup in Japan, where the Buzato team took third place.
Irina Voronkova and Anna Lazareva, the heroes of the national team’s bronze success, are now close to another triumph. Both girls play in Turkish clubs that made it to the semi-finals of the Champions League.
27-year-old Voronkova this season, after winning the Russian championship, moved from Lokomotiv Kaliningrad to Eczacibashi (Istanbul), and Lazareva has been working for the benefit of Fenerbahce, which is coached by Zoran Terzic, for the second year in a row.
The future of the national team
The head coach of the Russian national team in 2021 invited the brightest representative of our volleyball, 19-year-old Arina Fedorovtseva, to the capital of Turkey. At the age of 17, a Muscovite became the most valuable player of the victorious European Championship among girls, won the Russian Championship as part of Dynamo Kazan, and made her debut at the Olympics the following year.
When Godina and Sokolova lost to the Chinese in the dramatic finals of Athens 2004, Arina’s father Sergei Fedorovtsev was celebrating an Olympic gold medal in rowing. Now, the same hopes are placed on his daughter as on the stars of that volleyball era.
It must be admitted that this is no coincidence. With her game, Arina already stands out not only on the European continent. In the very first international season, she became the best player in the Club World Championship, where Fenerbahce took third place, and was included in the list of the best players in the world according to the International Volleyball Federation. In 2022, Arina became the MVP of the Turkish Super Cup.
In the current conditions, there is no better development of the situation than the current tandem of the head coach of the national team and its best volleyball player. Together with the strong diagonal Anna Lazareva, Terzic has a micro version of the national team at his disposal – a useful alignment in anticipation of the return of the Russian team to the world stage.
An intriguing continuation
Last season, Fedorovtseva and Lazareva took silver in an extremely strong Turkish championship, where Vakifbank won four draws in a row. The dominance of this team also extends to the world stage: in 2021, Fedorovtseva and Lazareva lost to the “bankers” in the semifinals, who then became the winners of the club world championship.
By the will of the lot, in the semi-finals of the current Champions League, Terzic’s team will again have to play with Vakifbank. Last season, the team of Giovanni Guidetti won this competition for the fifth time in its history. Fenerbahce have fewer chances in a two-legged confrontation, but with Fedorovtseva now playing fantastically, the Serbian coach has more opportunities to reach the final.
In the second semi-final against the Italian club Igor Gorgonzola, our second player Irina Voronkova will lead the 28-time Turkish champions to her second Champions League trophy. In “Edzhzadzhibashi” the Russian is already one of the leaders, although she is playing in the legendary club for the first season.
It is pointless to predict the final result at such a level, but one thing is clear – the chances of the Turkish team directly depend on the game of the Russians, who remain one of the best volleyball players in Europe. Their potential meeting in the final will be a real gem of the season.
Source: Sportbox
Alberta Robinson is a sports journalist and author, who is currently associated with the publication Sportish, where she writes about sports related news and events. With a passion for sports and a keen eye for detail, Robinson brings in-depth analysis and insightful commentary to her writing.