Iran-Bulgaria: Revenge fight without a head coach/ looking for the sixth victory – Mehr News Agency | Iran and world’s news
According to Mehr news agency, the third and final week of the Nations League 2023 preliminary stage will be followed from July 13 to 19 with 32 matches in the two cities of Anaheim, America and Pasaia, Philippines, to determine the seven teams that will advance to the final stage. Poland has been confirmed as the host of the final stage.
Iran’s national volleyball team, which started the third week of the League of Nations with a match against France without the presence of the head coach Behrouz Atai and some of the team’s main players, will face Bulgaria in its second match on Friday, July 16, at seven o’clock in the morning.
These two teams will face each other for the 10th time in history. In the previous matches, our country has won five times, and in four matches, the Bulgarians have left the field as winners.
The last defeat of the Iranian team is related to last year and the League of Nations 2022, when the national team lost 3-0 to the opponent, and Behrouz Atai’s students are looking for revenge against the opponent in the Anaheim match to get their sixth win against Bulgaria in Make official competitions.
Of course, winning this competition is not an easy task, because the Bulgarian national volleyball team has participated in the Olympic Games for eight times in its work file, winning the runner-up position and silver medal in Moscow in 1980.
Since 1949, when Bulgarian men participated in the World Championship for the first time, they have participated in 19 rounds, and the second place and silver medal in 1970 is their best performance in these competitions. The Bulgarian national volleyball team has reached the third place in the world in four seasons.
The national volleyball players of this country also have the bronze medal of the 2007 World Cup in their honors file.
Of course, the Bulgarians did not perform very well in the first two weeks of the Nations League 2023, and with one victory and 6 points, they were placed in the 15th place in the ranking of this competition, and in the ranking of the World Federation, they took the 25th place with 146.84 points. Bulgaria lost to Germany in their first match in the third week and is currently in the 16th place of the League of Nations 2023.
However, Iran’s national volleyball team is in the eleventh place in the League of Nations table with two wins and eight points, and its points are frozen in the World Federation table and will remain in the eleventh place with a score of 241.05 until the end of the tournament.
Among the 14 players introduced to participate in the third week of the League of Nations, Seyed Mohammad Mousavi, Morteza Sharifi, Mehdi Jaloh, Ali Ramezani, Bardiya Saadat, Javad Karimi, Amir Hossein Esfandiar, Mohammad Reza Mouzan and Mohammad Reza Hazratpour have experience playing against the Bulgarian team, and Ali Hajipour, Pouria Hosseinkhanzadeh, Armin Afshinfar, Mohammad Walizadeh and Shahrouz Homayonfarmanesh will face this team for the first time.
Kolo Nikolay, Atanasovo Martin, Gutso Sotoslav, Asparov Asparo, Seganov Giorgi, Karyagin Deniz, Groz Dano Alex, Dimitro Dimitar, Salparov Teodor, Bogilo Martin, Rao Delcho, Pancho Nikolay, Bratov Valentin and Pedkov Ilya are the 14 players of the Bulgarian team in this competition. And Plamen Constantino is in charge of this team.
The time and result of the meeting of the national volleyball teams of Iran and Bulgaria from the beginning until now are as follows:
1970 (world championship): Iran (0) – Bulgaria (3)
2006 (World Championship): Iran (0) – Bulgaria (3)
2016 (World League): Iran (3) – Bulgaria (1)
2018 (League of Nations): Iran (3) – Bulgaria (1)
2018 (World Championship): Iran (3) – Bulgaria (1)
2018 (world championship): Iran (0) – Bulgaria (3)
2019 (League of Nations): Iran (3) – Bulgaria (zero)
2021 (League of Nations): Iran (3) – Bulgaria (zero)
2022 (League of Nations): Iran (0) – Bulgaria (3)