CEV Champions League 2024
On Sunday it’s time for the Super Finals: Trentino Itas – Jastrzebski Węgiel will be the match that will award the trophy. Live from 4pm on DAZN
The final of the 2024 CEV Champions League will be played on Sunday 5 May at the Sports Hall in Antalya (Turkey). In the match that awards the annual title of European Club Champion, Trentino Itas will face the Polish side Jastrzebski Wegiel. Kick-off scheduled for 4pm Italian time (5pm local time) live on DAZN.
After just under two years of waiting, it is once again time for the yellow-blue team to return to the assault on the title of European Champion, playing the last and most important match of the 2023/24 season. Podrascanin and his teammates arrived in Turkey on Friday afternoon, at the end of an entire week of training, without official matches, in which the technical staff was able to complete Lavia’s recovery and propose a notable volume of activities to reach the goal in the best possible way. appointment, both from a technical and physical point of view.
In the roster there are seven players who have already played in a Champions League Final with the yellow-blue shirt: Michieletto (2021 and 2022 editions), Podrascanin (2021, 2022), Nelli (2016), D’Heer (2022), Cavuto (2022 ), Sbertoli (2022), Lavia (2022). None of them have ever won the trophy. Eight debutants: Acquarone, Berger, Garcia, Kozamernik, Laurenzano, Magalini, Pace and Rychlicki.
For Trentino Volley, the one scheduled for Sunday will be the tenth European final in its history, the sixteenth international in the last fifteen years. It will be the forty-third overall; the calculation also includes the last twenty-six matches played on a national level: 9 Scudetto finals (2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2017 and 2023), 9 Italian Cup finals (2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2022 and 2023), 8 Super Cups (2008, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2018 and 2021). The result in the matches that award a title sees the yellow-blue team victorious in twenty out of forty-two circumstances.
Jastrzebski Wegiel arrives at the match in Antalya fresh from winning their second consecutive Polish title (the fourth in their history), obtained just a week earlier against Zawiercie and as the only finalist who was able to confirm their performance compared to the previous season. The Club is still chasing its first international victory, having come close to doing so several times in the recent past; in fact, there are two participations in the Champions League Final Four in the archive, when that type of game formula was still adopted. To become the second Polish club to win the highest continental trophy, it will rely on a very physical squad, led on the bench by the expert Marcelo Mendez, (already an opponent of Trento on the bench of Palma de Mallorca and Sada Cruzeiro), who makes use of the setter Frenchman Toniutti, his compatriot Patry (formerly Cisterna and Milano), the central defenders Huber (formerly Kedzierzyn-Kozle and the only player still reigning champion) and Gladyr (formerly Siena) and above all the Polish spiker Fornal, his team’s top scorer in the tournament with 139 points.
Trentino Volley is preparing to play its third SuperFinals against a Polish team, after those played in the 2021 (Verona) and 2022 (Ljubljana) editions again against Kedzierzyn-Kozle, which won in four and three sets respectively. In its history there have already been five finals played against teams from Poland, also taking into account the matches that decided the 2009 Club World Cup (3-0 at Belchatow), 2010 (3-1 at Belchatow) and 2011 (3-1 at Belchatow). on Jastrzebski Wegiel – 14 October). In total, the official matches played against Polish clubs are twenty-seven: fourteen with Kedzierzyn-Kozle, five with Rzeszow, four with Belchatow and two with Czestochowa and Jastrzebski; The score is 19-8 for the yellow-blues. The first ever meeting with Jastrzebski also took place on a neutral pitch, but decidedly closer to Trento: at the PalaOnda in Bolzano on 26 March 2011, on the occasion of the Semi-final of the CEV Champions League, later won by Trentino Volley as the organizing club. The two clubs were also supposed to meet in the quarter-finals of the 2020 edition, but the pandemic forced the European Confederation to interrupt the event, never to resume it.
Fabio Soli (Trentino Itas coach): “Daniele’s recovery has allowed us to carry out a series of full training sessions, something that hasn’t happened for two months now and the difference can be seen. We tried to make the most of this period to bring the team into the best conditions currently possible. The players deserved this Final, they believe in it and want to live it to the fullest; they can do it because, when they play as a real group, they know how to do exceptional things. In front of us we will find an opponent like Jastrzebski who is performing very well and who has further cemented his certainties thanks to the recent victory of the second consecutive Polish championship. It is a very physical sextet, directed by the expert Toniutti, with powerful hitters and an excellent block-defense system. For this reason we will have to be able to be incisive with the serve and consequently work well on the second line.”
CEV Champions League 2024 – Super Finals
Sunday 5 May 2024, 4.00 pm
Trentino Itas – Jastrzebski Węgiel (POL)
Live DAZN
Commentary by Orazio Accomando
The Champions League Finals with an Italian Club
https://www.legavolley.it/2024/cev-champions-league-2024-unitaliana-in-finale-per-la-16esima-volta/
Statistical curiosities about Itas Trentino – Jastrzebski Węgiel
https://www.trentinovolley.it/it/news/superlega/53099-champions-league-note-statistiche-sulla-finale-jastrzebski-wegiel-trentino-itas
Champions League honor roll
2000/01 Paris Volleyball (FRA)
2001/02 Lube Banca Marche Macerata (ITA)
2002/03 Lokomotiv Belgorod (RUS)
2003/04 Lokomotiv Belgorod (RUS)
2004/05 Tours VB (FRA)
2005/06 Sisley Treviso (ITA)
2006/07 Vfb Friedrichshafen (GER)
2007/08 Dinamo Kazan (RUS)
2008/09 Trentino Volley (ITA)
2009/10 Trentino BetClic (ITA)
2010/11 Trentino BetClic (ITA)
2011/12 Zenit Kazan (RUS)
2012/13 Lokomotiv Novosibirsk (RUS)
2013/14 Belogorie Belgorod (RUS)
2014/15 Zenit Kazan (RUS)
2015/16 Zenit Kazan (RUS)
2016/17 Zenit Kazan (RUS)
2017/18 Zenit Kazan (RUS)
2018/19 Cucine Lube Civitanova (ITA)
2019/20 not assigned
2020/21 Grupa Azoty Kedzierzyn-Kozle (POL)
2021/22 Grupa Azoty Kedzierzyn-Kozle (POL)
2022/23 Grupa Azoty Kedzierzyn-Kozle (POL)
Link to the Champions Cup roll of honour:
https://www.legavolley.it/eventi/albo-doro-coppe-europee/albo-doro-coppa-dei-campioni/
