I am sure that the Italians won't like this at all...
CEV Champions League 2026
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I’m also ok with a semi-league format; sth like 2 pools of 8 teams each. You have then at least 4 good teams in each pool and that gives you at least 12 competitive games in each pool during the group phase. Then at the end of group phase top 4 of each pool qualify to quarter final and match as 1st vs 4th , 2nd vs 3rd. This also helps get rid of the current weird knockout phase seedings. There might be complaints about the increased number of games but most Turkish & Italian teams have the roster enough to rotate against weaker opponents.
Pretty good idea indeed! Sounds quite fair as well.
In my ideal world, it would be 12 teams only. 4 Turkish+4 Italian teams. The other 4 teams are coming from qualification tournaments from polish, German, French, Romanian, Greek, Serbian Champions.
Cev should improve top level and channel other mid and upper mid teams to cev cup with a better format there as well
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This format could be perfect for us, but the most of the Italian teams could face serious injury and mental problems. Milano, Scandicci and mostly Novara does not always wins easily against the middle and the weak teams of the Serie. The usually play a lot of competitive matches in their league and a format like that could be a disaster for them.
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This format could be perfect for us, but the most of the Italian teams could face serious injury and mental problems. Milano, Scandicci and mostly Novara does not always wins easily against the middle and the weak teams of the Serie. The usually play a lot of competitive matches in their league and a format like that could be a disaster for them.
sounds a them problem? They should be better at winning against teams they are better than lol
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This format could be perfect for us, but the most of the Italian teams could face serious injury and mental problems. Milano, Scandicci and mostly Novara does not always wins easily against the middle and the weak teams of the Serie. The usually play a lot of competitive matches in their league and a format like that could be a disaster for them.
Milano, Scandicci, Novara and Monza-Milano will anyway advance to the SF of the league, there's like 5-10% threat from Chieri and that would be it. Serie A1 isn't a competitive league like it used to be in the past, if you can't manage your team under these circumstances, it's on you.
Any format increasing the number of games between top teams would be more than welcomed.
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Nobody says that Cuneo and Macerata will dominate against Scandicci and Novara in the quarters, but they can make their lives difficult during the middle of the season. It happens literally every season and these team must try much harder than the others.
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Italian teams would only struggle financially to afford CL all years, excluded the top 4/5.
I have been asking for a change of format for a while. Not only Champions League, but also CEV Cup (with Challenge Cup merged with it or just discontinued).
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Italian teams would only struggle financially to afford CL all years, excluded the top 4/5.
I have been asking for a change of format for a while. Not only Champions League, but also CEV Cup (with Challenge Cup merged with it or just discontinued).
SAme here! I thought merging cev and challenge cup was one of the promises of new cev president . Of course nothing has been done since he is in power😒
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Not only Champions League, but also CEV Cup (with Challenge Cup merged with it or just discontinued).
They can keep Challenge Cup, but it should be a Conference League alike tournament, thus reserved to teams coming from less competitive leagues. I don't see the point of having Galatasaray or Chieri playing a tournament where their only real game is against each others.
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They can keep Challenge Cup, but it should be a Conference League alike tournament, thus reserved to teams coming from less competitive leagues. I don't see the point of having Galatasaray or Chieri playing a tournament where their only real game is against each others.
Conference League is a joke as well... You get to see some decent match in QFs or SFs if the brackets are good... Apparently Serie A clubs don't want to play at all, trying to avoid the qualification instead of flying for months to Moldavia, Latvia and so on...
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SAme here! I thought merging cev and challenge cup was one of the promises of new cev president . Of course nothing has been done since he is in power😒
From what I know, there are talks about both of these changes (two Euro-Cups and different CL format) ongoing. But like I always mention, the CEV president and Board of Administration (or whatever its name is) are selected mostly by smaller federations, so e.g. any idea for elitist CL formula are unfortunately unrealistic from political standpoint.
That being said, there are several minor changes that should be easy to introduce. For example, I like the concept in football of Europa League (CEV Cup equivalent) winner playing in the CL the next year, and I have no problems with such concept in volleyball as well. League phase in CL instead of group stage - even with let's say two additional legs - would be clearly much more interesting than what we've been receiving in the last 25 years or so. Combining CEV and Challenge Cups with broader group of clubs represented so far in both these events now - is also a logical choice.
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From what I know, there are talks about both of these changes (two Euro-Cups and different CL format) ongoing. But like I always mention, the CEV president and Board of Administration (or whatever its name is) are selected mostly by smaller federations, so e.g. any idea for elitist CL formula are unfortunately unrealistic from political standpoint.
That being said, there are several minor changes that should be easy to introduce. For example, I like the concept in football of Europa League (CEV Cup equivalent) winner playing in the CL the next year, and I have no problems with such concept in volleyball as well. League phase in CL instead of group stage - even with let's say two additional legs - would be clearly much more interesting than what we've been receiving in the last 25 years or so. Combining CEV and Challenge Cups with broader group of clubs represented so far in both these events now - is also a logical choice.
Like 20 years ago cev cup equivalent tournament champion was already getting a slot in CL next year right? Or am I remembering something wrong?🫣