European club championships determine participants in the Champions League: 12 teams have already secured a spot, Levski Sofia will represent Bulgaria

As the end of the national volleyball championships in Europe approaches, the battle for medals goes hand in hand with that for the right to participate in European club tournaments. Currently,twelve teamshave already secured their place in the most prestigious competition – the Champions League – for the 2025/2026 season. A total of20 teamswill participate in the group stage of the tournament, of which18are directly qualified based on national quotas, and the remaining2will be determined through qualification rounds.

The distribution of places for next season, according to the quotas of the European Volleyball Confederation (CEV), looks like this:

• Three places each:Italy and Poland.

• Two places each:Germany, Turkey, and Belgium.

• One place each:France,Bulgariaand Czech Republic.

• Three places by ranking are allocated to Russia, but the country remains excluded from international competitions.

The following participants are already known:

• Poland (2 of 3): Bogdanka LUK Lublin and Aluron CMC Warta Zawiercie(PlusLiga finalists). The third Polish representative will be the winner of the bronze medal match between PGE Projekt Warsaw and Jastrzębski Węgiel.

• Italy (2 of 3): Itas Trentino and Cucine Lube Civitanova(SuperLega finalists). The third spot for Italy will be taken by the winner of the concluded bronze medal playoff between Perugia and Piacenza.

• Germany (2 of 2): Berlin Recycling Volleys and SVG Lüneburg(Bundesliga finalists).

• Turkey (2 of 2): Ziraat Bank Ankara and Galatasaray Istanbul(Efeler League finalists).

• Belgium (2 of 2): Knack Volley Roeselare and Volley Haasrode Leuven(Belgian Championship finalists).

• France (1 of 1): Montpellier Volley(as the Supercup winner for 2024).

• Bulgaria (1 of 1):The team ofLevski Sofia, who, as the champion of Bulgaria, will participate in the Champions League. "The Blues" also participated in the tournament last season.

A few more spots remain to be filled – the third team from Poland (the bronze winner), the third team from Italy (the bronze winner between Perugia and Piacenza), and the representative of the Czech Republic.

An important detail for the Polish finalists is that both Bogdanka LUK Lublin and Aluron CMC Warta Zawiercie will be placed in the first pot for the Champions League group stage draw.

We are yet to see which teams will complete the list of participants in the elite European tournament next season.
Provided that the players remain with their current teams, next season's Champions League is expected to feature the following Bulgarian volleyball players and one Bulgarian team:

• Alex Grozdanov with the team of Bogdanka LUK Lublin (Poland)

• Alex Nikolov with the team of Cucine Lube Civitanova (Italy)

• Martin Atanasov with the team of Galatasaray (Turkey)

• Dimitar Dimitrov with the team of Montpellier (France)

• The team ofLevski Sofia (Bulgaria), as the country's champion.

This outlines a significant Bulgarian participation in the elite European club competition in the upcoming season.