The Mall of Asia in Pasay, Manila, has its own peculiar buzz – it's not just a shopping center, but an antechamber to a volleyball arena where drums thunder and voices echo, mixing the smell of fried food, cold air from the air conditioning vents, and that sweet tension before match point. In this temple of commerce, one of Asia's largest, Borislav Georgiev sits at a table with two beers between us – the boy from Dupnitsa who today carries the responsibility as Qatar's setter, but in the past was part of that silver generation of Bulgaria which in 2010 in Belarus promised to be the backbone of the men's national team. Qatar had just scored its first victory in the history of world championships, and instead of staying in the locker room and celebrating with the others, he literally shot off to another hall, a 30-minute taxi ride away, to watch the Bulgaria-Chile match – because, as he would say later, "blood is thicker than water."
Initially, his words are timid, as if memory is stuck in the sands of the long years spent in Qatar; but the more he speaks, the clearer the path becomes – from Dupnitsa to Samokov, where he settled because of his wife Dilyana; from Belarus and the silver medal, through the camp with Rado Stoichev, where the chance never came, to that summer camp in Piacenza with Angelo Lorenzetti (and in the management – Hristo Zlatanov, son of the legend Dimitar Zlatanov), when for five days a dream opened the door and then slammed it shut. His narrative is even and calm, but it contains that quiet hurt that no longer stings, but simply stands as a scar.
2010 was their summer – silver with the youth team, a sense of direction and purpose. The plan was simple and, at first glance, clever – the core from Belarus to gather for the entire season at Levski, with training sessions to turn talents into men, to grow together, not to scatter. At the World Championship, however, fate intervened without any sentiment – a tough group with the USA, Brazil, and Japan, and Zlatan Yordanov – the engine, the boy with confidence and a powerful hit – got injured in the very first match. Against Japan, we led 2:0 and lost 2:3, and that evening, in that hotel bathroom, when he pressed the flush button, his finger got stuck, his hand instinctively recoiled, and his nail detached – a scene he recounts almost without emotion, but the picture is so visceral that the reader feels the pain. Until the end of the World Championship, Bobby only signed the protocols as captain, and after the tournament, instead of analysis and care, came the label: "this generation – no good." Hopes were crossed out this way – not with arguments and work, but with phrases thrown over the shoulder.
The summer of 2011 brought a call-up for a camp with Rado Stoichev. The team was divided into A and B, and from B, boys were sometimes "moved up" to train with Kaziyski, Zhekov, Vlado Nikolov – to feel the speed, the height, the nerves of a real game. He waited for three practices in a row: for the first, they called someone else, for the second, again someone else, for the third – he also wasn't chosen. In a friendly match against Iran at "Armeec" Arena, he got half a set – not time for evaluation, but a gesture for the record. Then – a line-up in "Slavia" hall, a brief "you're free," and everything ended without having begun. "If they had let me play and I had shown that I was no good, I would have taken my bag and left on my own, but the chance never came," he says, and in this sentence there is no resentment, but clarity: the system doesn't just make mistakes, it doesn't even check.
A second chance came – Piacenza, summer 2011. Angelo Lorenzetti led the training sessions, and Hristo Zlatanov was in the club's management. Bobby was not a team player, he went for a camp, which Italian clubs often do when their national team players are absent. He played three matches – against Cuneo, Ravenna, and another opponent, coming in and running the sets – not as a guest who came to go through the motions, but as someone who was given a chance to build rhythm, to take risks, to organize saved balls from defense into attack. Lorenzetti likedthe shortsetter, and through Nikolay Zhelyazkov in the winter came the promise: "next week we're sending the contract." Five days later, the management changed the coaching staff after a home defeat, new people came in, they brought in setter Lucas Campa, and the contract evaporated. "Fate," says Bobby, but adds quietly, as if speaking to himself: "In Italy they let me play in three matches, in our country – I didn't even get one practice."
Then came that phone call from Ventsi Ragin (a teammate from Slavia and the "silver" national team, who now plays for Neftochimic), which sounded like an episode from an adventure series: a team participating in the Emir Cup in Qatar was looking for a setter for two weeks. He went, they beat a team with Osmany Juantorena in the squad in the semi-final, and they liked him; the summer passed in anticipation, September 2013 brought the brief dialogue: "Are you still interested?" – "Yes." – "You fly the day after tomorrow." In two days, he settled the documents with "Slavia," left, and at the airport he immediately understood that another world was possible: an apartment, a car, a SIM card, pocket money, sneakers – not luxury, but normality that said "welcome, play." He started at Police – a state team under the Ministry of Interior, with the status of a "resident" (de facto local, who does not occupy a foreign player quota). He played, organized the game, learned a new culture and another locker room, where the only requirement of him was: to do what he does best.
After a second place in the championship in 2014, came the offer to change sports nationality. Bobby took stock before making a decision – in Bulgaria, resentment from the federation and the label "nothing will come of him"; here – trust, a signature, a prospect. He logically accepted the offer. According to FIVB rules, he had to wait two years to wear the uniform of another country; 2016 was his first official match for Qatar – World League, Level Three, first victories, first headlines in newspapers, first texts where the country's name and its volleyball came together in one sentence. And just when it seemed the path was clear, 2018 brought an absurdity: the squad could include up to two "foreigners" with non-Muslim names. Between him – "Bobby," and a Serbian teammate, they chose the other. Thus, five years remained without a national team – not because of form or injury, but because of a rule about names.
During these years, life definitively found him in Doha – Dilyana, his wife from Samokov, their children Hristo (2019), who has a talent for football, and Boyana (2021), a home where they always speak Bulgarian, and that dilemma, familiar to many families abroad: school in English, returning home someday, how not to lose the language and roots while moving forward. When he is in Bulgaria, Bobby doesn't go to "rest from the ball" – he goes to the hall and trains with Levski. From these trainings also comes his clear opinion about Stoil Palev – a boy who "grew a lot, a very correct setter," who may not be Simeon, but "nobody is Simeon, because Moni Nikolov is extraordinary" – that profile who with a block, serve, and quick decision-making changes the course of the game out of nowhere.
2023 brought things back to where his story always wanted to be written – under the spotlights. At the Asian Championship in Iran, Qatar won bronze – the first medal in the country's history. In the semi-final, they took a set from Japan with Sekita, Ishikawa, Nishida, losing 1:3, and for the bronze, they beat China. The ranking pushed them high enough to make it clear they were in the World Championship; there also came the historical first victory – the one after which he left the celebration and ran to the Mall of Asia Arena to watch Bulgaria–Chile. If you ask why, the answer is shorter than any explanation: "blood is thicker than water."
In club life, years at Police followed, one year on loan at Qatar SC, and since last year – a five-year contract with Al Arabi until 2030. Bobby smiles when they suggest that at 38 it might be too late for a setter: "there are people who maintain their level even at 41" – an answer that doesn't sound like an excuse, but like the experience of a person for whom the rhythm of the game is a profession, and insight into the game – second nature.
I'll hardly come to play in Bulgaria at club level, because in the FIVB system I am Qatari and a club in our country would have to pay an international transfer to register you as a foreigner, Bobby explains the lack of prospects for returning home. He too is not spared that cultural shock when he returns to his native latitudes – service without a smile, indifference, and all the small everyday things that are regulated abroad, but in our country often depend on chance. Nevertheless, after the first year I will get used to it, at least that's what I've heard from Bulgarians who have returned home after a long absence, Bobby is sure.
And what about that "silver generation"? Some realized their potential, others scattered around the world, a third remained in the "what if" category. Bobby doesn't look for excuses; he is one of those people who don't dramatize, but state the facts as they happened. But between his lines gleam differences that Bulgarian volleyball should not forget: talent that doesn't get a chance, and for a country with 6 million inhabitants, this is an unnecessary luxury.
And again – blood is thicker than water. After Qatar's historic victory, he leaves the locker room, leaving the music and shouting behind him, and walks through the corridors of the Mall of Asia towards the adjacent hall. The drums are already beating, the voices of the few Bulgarian fans fill the space, and he smiles in that way that people smile who have found their home far away, but have never left the real one. "It's not easy… especially when it's far away," he repeats, echoing the beginning of our conversation – and this time in his words there is no sadness, but a resigned affection.
That's how his confession ends – not with an excuse, not with a reproach, but with faith in the game and the future of Bulgarian volleyball.
And at that moment, in the establishment next to the arena, I feel most clearly that whatever passport he holds, wherever he plays, Bobby Georgiev remains that boy from Dupnitsa who once brought Bulgaria silver from Europe. And he will remain so until the end!
