European Championship 2017 Azerbaijan&Georgia

  • What a come back!!! From 19-12 to 22-23 UKR


    What a come back, but what a waste by Ukraine at the end! At that point I was definitely cheering for a tie break!
    At 23-23 Ukraine first did a terrible construction that didn't allow to spike, and when Turkey didn't close the free ball... ball attacked out.
    At 24-23, ball spiked outside the antenna (I don't think it's a very easy ball to judge because you can relay only on the trajectory of the ball, but it's incredible the referees missed that... I mean, the second referee is right there...)


  • Every euro i think the same thing, they are vulnerable etc. yet somehow they end up winning the thing. By the way someone mentioned Startseva, is she injured? She definitely is their premium setter IMO


    From what I know, there's lots of complex stuff going on behind the scene. E.g. they wouldn't call Sheshenina as there's some kind of conflict. Note that both Pankova and Uraleva (=Filishtinskaya) are de facto benchers in their teams. They are younger though... and Pankova won two euro finals.

  • she was named Kovalenko 10 years ago , so I think Poznyak is her married name or ? :D


    As far as I remember she's born Poznyak and Kovalenko was her first husband.



    You know, they change their name when they arrive there in order to conceal the fact that they are not from "the land of fire" orginally. Mammadovas name initially was Skazka and Hasanovas was Kharchenko. I do not know about Samadova, but she represented Ukraine in some of the CEV junior/youth competitions at least two times back in the days, ca 2011-2012, and if I remember properly her name back then was not Samadova, but what was it? I can not remember myself.


    Samadova was born as Liza Ruban. That reminds me of how all the Cuban players were given Azeri names when they took the citizenship some years ago :rolll:


  • Every euro i think the same thing, they are vulnerable etc. yet somehow they end up winning the thing. By the way someone mentioned Startseva, is she injured? She definitely is their premium setter IMO


    From a German NT point of view I can explain the issue playing against Russia, I think: you have to serve very well to keep pressure on their reception, but if you can't keep it up, they simply outplay you on the net. They are tall and with a high-grade block with much discipline, they attack high and hard, they pressurize you all the time, when you can't counter completely (especially by service). The end of the story, and this is not only Germany, which is in this position, they overpower you mostly and you can't do much about it. The most serious threat comes from two teams obviously: the powerful Serbs and the technical and tactical excellent Italians, who can also defend a lot. All others are usually inferior...

  • from what i remember, just a few players like the parkhomenkos (i.e. kurt), abdulayzimova (MB), habibova (setter), karimova (MB), aliyeva (L) are from AZE.


    rahimova and bayramova are from UZB, mammadova, samadova and hasanova from UKR, poznyak and yagubova from BLR, kurbanova and zhidkova from RUS, matiasovska/aghayeva/kulan is from SVK, etc.


    i don't think the problem is the ethnicity of the players, it is the fact that they are imported and who become azeri on paper only; rather than domestically developed and trained. remember all the qataris and bahrainis who couldn't even remember their own (new) arabic names?


  • i don't think the problem is the ethnicity of the players


    I do think it's a problem as well and not because I don't believe they're true Azeris or whatever. Quite simply, it is problematic if your good native born players can only come from like 2% of the population, as has been the case with Azerbaijan. The sport obviously can't grow that way.
    It's a similar problem with Kazakhstan. Pretty much all of their NT players are Slavic. Now, there are a lot more Russians and other Slavs in Kazakhstan than in Azerbaijan, so that means there's more to choose from, but still, it means the talent pool is already quite limited right from the start.


    And that's most likely a sign of deeper social issues that take a long time to change.

  • Congrats to turkish girls and good luck for the next match..


    they shouldnt have had this crisis in the end the match must have finished much earlier and easier..


    i liked block-defence and serves. i didnt like offence,passing and setting


    the Midddles were very good at blocking. i misssed the first set .in the other sets i liked Kübra's blocks.She is a very good blocker when she is where she should be.Eda was great at blocking as well


    Neriman is the main offensive weapon thanks to the OPPs weak performances
    Gözde Kırdar is offensively having a bad tournament.she should help Neriman more than that


    more importantly,i cant like Naz's game.She is not terrible but when the things get worse she starts to play badly and becomes predictable.she has to set more "good-decent sets"/well passed sets to the middles not the bad ones at crucial times.this also will help Neriman get some rest and may cause the opponent to forget Neriman at times in the game.



    today i liked the team's struggle and defence.I think Örge is not an agile libero..she should be faster at defence.Merve can do better


    id like to watch Gamze Alikaya at times


    Polen tried to help team but she lacks power. Meryem Boz is not the player of this level (at least mentally not)


    i like Hande but she stop making mistakes at crucial times!


  • I do think it's a problem as well and not because I don't believe they're true Azeris or whatever. Quite simply, it is problematic if your good native born players can only come from like 2% of the population, as has been the case with Azerbaijan. The sport obviously can't grow that way.


    but that's not even the case. AZE is not drawing its players from the 2% russian or slavic minority. they are drawn from ABROAD! and AZE has now recruited athletes from cuba, jamaica, kenya, ethiopia etc. for its athletics team (which TUR is now copying, and BHR and QAT already did before).


    KAZ is different in the sense that their players are from the country (that i know of). in the women's team, there's sana jarlagassova and the backup setter batkuidina that are kazakh, i think, and the others are mostly slavic. in the men's teams, there's a few more kazakhs. i read that it's a reflection of the soviet era, when only russians were encouraged or promoted for sports. i think their hockey team for example is mostly slavs.


    but then look at athletes in the USA... black athletes are disproportionately represented in many sports.

  • in this tournament when a player from the opponents has a serve series turkey could has hard times like Rabadzieva did or like Ukranian players did (?).i guess this is bcz the OPP's weak perf.they cant kill the bad sets and its up to Neriman's perf.when she kills turkey overcomes .
    imh,Turkey should try to play with more offensive players on the court .Baladın could be on the court.we saw today that even though the passing was good yet the offence was not on the desired level therefore like Russia did with Voronkova Turkey could try Neriman-Baladın duo if Gözde Kırdar doenst have a good game

  • in this tournament when a player from the opponents has a serve series turkey could has hard times like Rabadzieva did or like Ukranian players did (?).i guess this is bcz the OPP's weak perf.they cant kill the bad sets and its up to Neriman's perf.when she kills turkey overcomes .
    imh,Turkey should try to play with more offensive players on the court .Baladın could be on the court.we saw today that even though the passing was good yet the offence was not on the desired level therefore like Russia did with Voronkova Turkey could try Neriman-Baladın duo if Gözde Kırdar doenst have a good game


    I don't think this is only Turkey's problem. All four teams of the group were having these 10-point eclipses. Very nervy volleyball.

  • I will repeat this again, the best Russian setter is still Startseva. I told it in the beginning of this summer too and now it is proved again. Both Filistinskaia and Kosianenko are retarding their team.

    Just watched the match between Russia and Bulgaria and the setting woes started from the very first set. Both setters have their own problems. Pankova is slow and predictable, while Filishstinkaia used the MBs more, her setting to 4 and 2 is quite problematic. Her sets to Goncharova in particular were sometimes ridiculous. They definitely need Startseva back next year for WCH if this team is to seriously compete.. Speaking of Goncharova, how many single blocks already she had in this tournament? :white: In the match against Bulgaria, she had at least two and I remember in the Turkey match she had one at a crucial moment against Neriman. Such a great opposite

  • if Bulgaria beats Germany next opponent will be Azerbaijan (of course if German girls offensively have a great match and serve well then they can beat Bulgaria but not an easy task!)



    what do you think about a probable Bulgaria-Azerbaijan QF match ?

  • For Azeri issue: I think I read in her recent interview that Rahimova is Ukrainian not Uzbek.


    It's funny because I wrote how terrible setters of this tournament are and majority agreed that Turkey had the best setters. So far, Naz is nothing but an ordinary setter and probably having the worst performance of her career. Guidetti should have made the cut and instead started to adapt Gamze to team already tonight. What will happen now if Naz is as bad against Poland or Russia? You can't just push Gamze to the court and expect her to play a fast game directly with players she never played in her club season. I think against Poland, setters performance wont matter that much, but against Russia, it can make a big difference to play a faster game than Naz's predictable setting.


    I feel really bad for Ukraine because I think they deserved to go further and they would very likely qualify if they were in another group. This also makes me think, maybe Russia,Bulgaria and Turkey are not that bad after all...I'm very curious to see how far they will reach and how these 3 will react to teams from other groups.


    Meanwhile, receiving with only Gizem Örge & Gözde worked excellent for Turkey, I think they received with 69% excellent as a team. :super:

  • but that's not even the case. AZE is not drawing its players from the 2% russian or slavic minority. they are drawn from ABROAD! and AZE has now recruited athletes from cuba, jamaica, kenya, ethiopia etc. for its athletics team (which TUR is now copying, and BHR and QAT already did before).


    KAZ is different in the sense that their players are from the country (that i know of). in the women's team, there's sana jarlagassova and the backup setter batkuidina that are kazakh, i think, and the others are mostly slavic. in the men's teams, there's a few more kazakhs. i read that it's a reflection of the soviet era, when only russians were encouraged or promoted for sports. i think their hockey team for example is mostly slavs.


    but then look at athletes in the USA... black athletes are disproportionately represented in many sports.


    Whether you like it or not, this is the reality. In the end of the day, there's nothing bad about moving the country for the sake of your career. Btw, every athlete may represent a different case: for some it is about the money, for others it is a chance to get to the Olympics/WCh. For USSR-born Natasha Skazka (and especially for her mom who was the driving force behind Mammadova's vball career), Baku didn't sound like a foreign city, despite the efforts of her local ex-communistic/current neonazi patriotic ideologists. Neither did sound Moscow/Odintsovo - but they didn't want her in Odintsovo. It wasn't only AZE/TUR/RUS who naturalised sportsmen with foreign or "semi-foreign" passports. The seeming victim of the talent drain, Ukraine used to be very active in this field too and had naturalised players in the NT. Not only in volleyball but also other sports - having an ex-Serbian and a ex-Brazilian in the roster of the football NT was a normal business a couple of years ago. Haven't read much bs re their lack of patriotism though.


    If we start digging into the ethnicity issues - would Saeid Marouf sound like a true Azeri to you? :)


    From the perspective of a country which is trying to develop its sports, buying athletes from abroad may sound like a good fast-track strategy but this would clearly have no long-term effect. However, an achievement always brings decent cash into sports and helps to generate the interest too. So, in the long run, may help recruiting talented aboriginals.

  • if Bulgaria beats Germany next opponent will be Azerbaijan (of course if German girls offensively have a great match and serve well then they can beat Bulgaria but not an easy task!)



    what do you think about a probable Bulgaria-Azerbaijan QF match ?

    In my humble opinion, it is virtually a coin flip or coin toss, whatever you might call it. 50-50. I am not impressed at all by what I have seen from Bulgaria so far. Reception is shaky, especially their libero is nightmarish as a receiver, block-defense poorly organized, the middles surprisingly ineffective in attack as well as the outside hitters and they have shown to be terrible front-runners, ie to consolidate a solid margin, but decent hunters. They seems to thrive to locate themselves in situations being on the edge, on the verge of collapsing score-wise, to incessantly challange the limit of nervousness. Rabadzhieva and Dimitrova seems mentally unfit to play more important matches, whenever it boils down to clutch moments in a set they seems to crumble under pressure and commit lousy errors. I have been impressed by the load of responsibility taken by Vasileva though, while not being the most effective or productive in general, with a good set she usually delivers when it really matters. However, the mental part of the game seems to speak in favour of AZE here, the amount of stoical calmness demonstrated tonight against Germany was impressive, they are more machine-like in their performance. Everything could boil down to whom receives the best (or less bad) and for me AZE actually looks the most solid there right now, relatively speaking. Regardless, Bulgaria must defeat Germany for this hypotetical scenario to even be implemented at all, of which I am not certain at all actually. This version of Bulgaria seems to always be ready to drive on a cliff and sink their ship to the ground, ie to impose self-defeating.

  • Whether you like it or not, this is the reality. In the end of the day, there's nothing bad about moving the country for the sake of your career. Btw, every athlete may represent a different case: for some it is about the money, for others it is a chance to get to the Olympics/WCh. For USSR-born Natasha Skazka (and especially for her mom who was the driving force behind Mammadova's vball career), Baku didn't sound like a foreign city, despite the efforts of her local ex-communistic/current neonazi patriotic ideologists. Neither did sound Moscow/Odintsovo - but they didn't want her in Odintsovo. It wasn't only AZE/TUR/RUS who naturalised sportsmen with foreign or "semi-foreign" passports. The seeming victim of the talent drain, Ukraine used to be very active in this field too and had naturalised players in the NT. Not only in volleyball but also other sports - having an ex-Serbian and a ex-Brazilian in the roster of the football NT was a normal business a couple of years ago. Haven't read much bs re their lack of patriotism though.


    If we start digging into the ethnicity issues - would Saeid Marouf sound like a true Azeri to you? :)


    From the perspective of a country which is trying to develop its sports, buying athletes from abroad may sound like a good fast-track strategy but this would clearly have no long-term effect. However, an achievement always brings decent cash into sports and helps to generate the interest too. So, in the long run, may help recruiting talented aboriginals.


    I generally enjoy reading your posts since I think you are a knowledgeable volleyball follower. However, nowadays it is really annoying to read your recent aggressive posts despising Ukrainian people. Please keep your political hostility out of a volleyball forum :hit: