Bulgaria’s women’s volleyball team sees progress

Dimo Tonev, manager of Bulgaria’s women’s national volleyball team, has mixed feelings following the end of Euro 2026 but believes the team is making progress. Bulgaria reached the round of 16, where they lost 0-3 to world and Olympic champions Italy.

Tonev commented on the team’s situation in the absence of head coach Marcello Abbondanza, CE Report quotes BTA.

“My impressions of the team’s performance are mixed. The important thing is that we managed to get through the group stage and qualify for the round of 16. That was important for the girls, for the federation, and for everyone. There is certainly some disappointment with our performance in some matches, but we have to understand that there is a certain logic to volleyball. It means that when you play against stronger teams and more accomplished players, it is quite difficult to compete with them.

“There may be some disappointment over the match against Greece, but we can see that Greece is playing very well in this tournament, and the same is true of Czechia. We had some good matches against strong opponents.

“More importantly, there was a great deal of desire among the girls who were in the squad. We have to give them credit and thank them for the effort they put in. We can see progress, both individually among the players and as a team. This year the team was completely different and considerably younger, but we should also note that the players who want to be here were the ones who played. We spent far too much time focusing on those who do not want to play for Bulgaria,” Tonev said.

Experienced player Zhana Todorova described returning to the Volleyball Nations League as the team’s most important objective.

“Our goal was to get out of the groups and enter the better bracket. The match against Greece was the obstacle standing between us and that goal. They were a beatable team, and that was the match we experienced most painfully at the championship. I am disappointed about it. My role is to make sure the negative emotions do not prevail. The atmosphere in the Nations League is different. The future of our team is in this tournament. Our number one goal is to climb back into it as quickly as possible,” Todorova said.

Photo: Chat GPT