The volleyball players from the Bulgarian national team will play their 8th match in this year's Volleyball Nations League today. Coach Gianlorenzo Blengini's boys face the strong Ukrainian team in their last match of the tournament in Group 6 from the second week of the competition at "Arena Stozice" in Ljubljana (Slovenia).
The match starts today at 2:00 PM Bulgarian time and will be broadcast live on MAX One. The last clash between the two teams in the Volleyball Nations League dates back to June 29, 2025, in Burgas. Then, Bulgaria took a set lead, but Ukraine made a full comeback and won 3:1 (20:25, 25:19, 26:24, 25:22).
After the historic victory over world champion Italy with 3:2 (18:25, 25:20, 25:23, 19:25, 15:9), the dramatic defeat by host Slovenia with 2:3 (25:19, 21:25, 25:17, 24:26, 6:15), and the new five-set battle against Canada, won 3:2 (25:27, 25:22, 21:25, 25:18, 15:11), the Bulgarian volleyball players are once again facing a serious challenge.
For the "Lions", this will be their fourth consecutive match in five days, with three of them going to the maximum five sets. The accumulated physical and mental fatigue will certainly be one of the main factors in the encounter, especially since the match starts in the early afternoon, and the recovery time after the drama against Canada was minimal. On top of that, Ukraine rested yesterday and will be maximally fresh for the match today.
On the other side of the net stands a team in excellent form. Ukraine arrived in Ljubljana with three consecutive victories - 3:1 over Brazil, 3:0 over Italy, and 3:1 over Canada. The return of star Oleh Plotnytskyi gave even more class to Raul Lozano's team, and logically, the Ukrainians have established themselves among the leading teams in the VNL provisional standings.
Therefore, any preliminary predictions for a decisive victory for Bulgaria would be overly optimistic. Under the current circumstances, the most important thing for the Bulgarian team will be to extract the maximum from this extremely tough match against an opponent playing with immense confidence.
The good news for Gianlorenzo Blengini is the successful inclusion of Denislav Bardarov against Canada. The young national player appeared for a longer period in the fourth set and remained on the court until the end of the tie-break, significantly contributing to the comeback. The longer rest that Martin Atanasov received also provides more options for the Italian specialist when determining the starting lineup.
It is not excluded that Blengini might resort to a wider rotation during the match, as the accumulated fatigue in the main seven players is already a serious factor after three consecutive five-set matches.
Here is the program for today in the Volleyball Nations League (times are Bulgarian time):

The program for the last day of the tournament in Ljubljana offers several direct clashes between contenders for a spot in the final tournament, and for Bulgaria, the match against Ukraine could turn out to be one of the most important in the battle for a place among the top eight teams in the Volleyball Nations League.

photo:volleyballworld.com