Players who have not fulfilled their potential

Sanja Malagurski
Extremely impressive in 2011, looked to be a superstar in the making, Serbia became European champions thanks to her. And then just a month later that horrific injury at World Cup ruined everything. She's still struggling to reach those heights again and probably never will.

Quote from JoanaBG

Sanja Malagurski
Extremely impressive in 2011, looked to be a superstar in the making, Serbia became European champions thanks to her. And then just a month later that horrific injury at World Cup ruined everything. She's still struggling to reach those heights again and probably never will.

Definitely agree. She was even more impressive than Brakocevic who was given all the attention. After that injury she became an ordinary attacker, still decent but she could have been such a monster

Unfortunately another serbian, Ana Antonijevic. Considering how talented she is and how clever she used to play, it's shameful to see how many times she has been injuried, I can't even remember the exact amount. Without the injury she could have gone to the Olympic games in 2012 for example. I always enjoyed watching Cannes team play mostly because of her diversity and creativity of setting.
She seems to be partly recovered and having some playing time in Volero, hopefully we see her in her best shape again.

Serbia definitely must be blessed when it comes to setters, both Maja and Ana (prior to her injuries of course) are two of the best setters in the world IMO.

Seems that Caterina it's taken this way....

Basically the whole German girl generation from 90/91. They were Youth European Champion in 2007 and Junior World Champion in 2009, but only Lenka Dürr and Anja Brandt (who was the weakest player of the starting line-up in 2009 and not even in the team in 2007) made it constantly to Senior NT.
Sarah Petrausch was by far the best player of the team back then, IIRC she was best scorer of the WCH tournament and came 2nd in MVP voting only to Brenda Castillo. Nowadays Petrausch is just an average player, being faaaar from NT. Berit Kauffeldt was supposed to be the next Christiane Fürst, being best blocker in YECH 2007 and making her debut in Senior NT already in 2008, but she never really made it to international level. Lena Möllers was praised beyond limits by all of her youth coaches and they all predicted a great career, but it's not happening. Saskia Hippe was supposed to be the next Angelina Grün, playing in 1st league with 14 years and in Senior NT with 17, but a lot of health problems (not only physical apparently...) prevented her from making it to the top.

Quote from Emil

Unfortunately another serbian, Ana Antonijevic. Considering how talented she is and how clever she used to play, it's shameful to see how many times she has been injuried, I can't even remember the exact amount. Without the injury she could have gone to the Olympic games in 2012 for example. I always enjoyed watching Cannes team play mostly because of her diversity and creativity of setting.
She seems to be partly recovered and having some playing time in Volero, hopefully we see her in her best shape again.

Serbia definitely must be blessed when it comes to setters, both Maja and Ana (prior to her injuries of course) are two of the best setters in the world IMO.

Ana was starting for Jedinstvo Uzice at the age of 14 and Jedinstvo was a great team back then. Huge team with Zakoc at the head coach position. 12 consecutive titles or something like that. Imagine how big Ana could have been.

I would say Ana Starcevic.

She is playing amazing and her first abroad season was in Turkey at age of 28-29. Now She is 30.
She never played for NT, and now I think that there is no many years in front of her to show her best. If she went before in stronger league She could be new Osmokrovic.
I think that She is doing amazing in Turkey.

Cynthia Barboza for sure

I think she is getting back there, she played good at the 2014 Grand Prix, and for no reason was left out from the World Championship.

She is doing great this season in Turkey, Remember she is only 25.

I hope she gets a chance to play at the Grand Prix to see how she does...

Quote from JoanaBG

Sanja Malagurski
Extremely impressive in 2011, looked to be a superstar in the making, Serbia became European champions thanks to her. And then just a month later that horrific injury at World Cup ruined everything. She's still struggling to reach those heights again and probably never will.

Tabitha Love

Quote from Kaziyski

I wanted to start this topic in order to see how many players haven't fulfilled their potential One player in particular "motivated" me to start this topic, I'm sure many of you will remember him

A great topic! Although we should probably create a separate one for female players, we got flooded here quickly

Let me interrupt the change of direction and return to the initial post. Yes, we remember Villena. I haven't watched him since these memorable junior-level games back then and I totally forgot about him. I can't say whether he couldn't adapt to senior volleyball or suffered from some misfortune. What I can say though is that it would be very difficult for a 1,94cm-tall opposite to leave a mark on senior level. Maybe it is one of the reasons he could not fulfill his potential. Had he grown a bit more... Well, who knows.

There are, unfortunately, two main reasons I can come up with when I talk about unrealized potential. One is poor integration/lack of quality, the other is injuries. To the first group I can include Ventsislav Trifonov, silver medallist from a Junior ECH. I think this guy had the skills to be a good player but wasted his youth in court suing former teams, trying to break away from slavery contracts, looking for new teams, etc. His father, as far as I am aware, acted like his manager and led him to some wrong decisions as well. He plays in Marek Union-Ivkoni now but is no longer the same player he used to be.

I can also add two professional players who have decent careers but could've, and were expected to, achieved more. These are Metodi Ananiev and Valentin Bratoev. Ananiev is fragile, often injured and even if he could have signed with some decent clubs, he never achieved anything serious. His sporadic NT appearances, when, of course, fit, were quite good. I also mention Bratoev not because the guy sucks or something like that, but because he needed to work (almost only) on his reception to be a very promising recruit to any team. The problem there, in my opinion, is his behaviour. He might've dominated and performed at more famous clubs under different circumstances.

I mention these players because I am more familiar with their careers. I will surely add non-Bulgarians if I think of good examples.

Quote from Gomes

Seems that Caterina it's taken this way....

I don't agree on this. Yes, she was considered super promising and won major awards such as MVP at the junior WCH, but she only turned 22 this month.. It's not like she's already 26 or older.. Maybe people expected her abilities to grow much faster and her to shine on the senior level, as much as on junior, and that apparently is not happening, but still she has time in front of her so she still might reach her potential

Quote from USAvolleyfan

Quoted from "Gomes"

Seems that Caterina it's taken this way....

I don't agree on this. Yes, she was considered super promising and won major awards such as MVP at the junior WCH, but she only turned 22 this month.. It's not like she's already 26 or older.. Maybe people expected her abilities to grow much faster and her to shine on the senior level, as much as on junior, and that apparently is not happening, but still she has time in front of her so she still might reach her potential

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Caterina shine as a good prospect, for sure she already have time and can develop a lot of, but remember that she was in 2012 Olympic games and right now I can not see a spot for her in Italy squad if Italy qualify in Japan.

She was weak and Osasco, Galatasaray and now she is a bench player in a Italian Club ( Ok, she had problems )

The new generation of Italian player will probably take her status of promise

I expect much more from her right know,I mean be good in back row or develop more her attack skills, I like her but she it's not more even one of the best players of her generation....

Quote from Gomes

Caterina shine as a good prospect, for sure she already have time and can develop a lot of, but remember that she was in 2012 Olympic games and right now I can not see a spot for her in Italy squad if Italy qualify in Japan.

She was weak and Osasco, Galatasaray and now she is a bench player in a Italian Club ( Ok, she had problems )

The new generation of Italian player will probably take her status of promise

I expect much more from her right know,I mean be good in back row or develop more her attack skills, I like her but she it's not more even one of the best players of her generation....

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I agree on USAvolleyball. I feel like repeating myself but Cate did indeed a very good job in Galatasaray last year. Meijners was the problem of that team. The only difference I see between Leys & Cate is experience. Cate was the best receiver of the team as well as one of the best servers and defenders. She was decent in attacking, probably finished around 35-40%. Maybe the problem is that people expected her to turn into a scoring machine while she became a defensive OH. I still think that she is much better than Malasevic and Fawcett as OH but if you play with 2 defensive OHs like Cate & Cruz, then you need stronger MBs. About the italian NT, who do you see as a candidate in the squad? Del Core who is close to retirement, Lucia Bosetti who became a 2nd libero, Di Iulio who is having a bad season, Tirozzi who is far from being stable. The list goes on...I still believe in Cate and I think Novara has really serious problems as a team, too bad she wasted a year there.

Malesevic it's a question,because she was really good for her level in the past summer but in Novara she hasn't doing a good job...I think that Malesevic is better than Caterina actually.

Leys is doing a better job than Cate so far...( IMO) Leys is evolving a lot. This is good for Belgium NT.

In Italy there is a young generation coming and they are good. ( golden sub 18 and top six and sub 20)

Tirozzi and Lucia are two defensive OH that are really good,and i Think that Lucia is still more trustful than Caterina on Attack.

Guerra can be a good material to Italian NT and Egonu is amazing.

Alessia Gennari its a good Defensive OH and young

cate went to London as a Receiver Opp and There is now Diouf and some young players for the future ( I didn't remember the name)

for Rio Centoni and Indre may will fight for a Spot... who knows if Ortolani has a chance too (in my opinion she was a better option to Italy than Cate in London 2012)

as OH Francesca, Del Core and Egonu will be there if nothing badly happens and if Italy pocket the ticket in Japan. there is still Lucia...

I like Caterina.. I hope she develop.I can't see more fire on her eyes but who knows..I hope you guys are right at the end. Let's see ..

how about some Polish players?
Anna Miros (Podolec)
Kinga Kasprzak (does anyone know what is it going on with her?!)