Bulgaria produced arguably the most entertaining five-set encounter of the Volleyball Men’s World Championship in the Philippines after outlasting USA to qualify for the semifinals for the first time in 19 years.
The second quarterfinal match of the day left fans at the fully packed SM Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay City on the edge of their seats as Bulgaria bounced back to stun USA 3-2 (21-25, 19-25, 25-17, 25-22, 15-13).
The Balkan nation, inspired by the Nikolov brothers, dug deep to rally from two sets down and force the fifth set where they held their nerve to hand USA their first loss of the competition.
Aleksandar Nikolov produced a match-high 29 points (26 kills, 1 block, 2 aces) to ensure Bulgaria not only remained unbeaten but also reached the semifinals for the first time since 2006 when they clinched bronze in Japan. Outside hitter Ethan Champlin led USA with 17 points.
“Oh, man! So many emotions! I am so tired that I can’t even express my happiness right now. It was such a battle! USA are so good and it could have gone either way in the end! So, I’m super, super happy we got the win. Now we’ve got to rest for a couple of hours and then we have another battle. I am excited for that, but right now I just want to lie down somewhere,” an elated Simeon Nikolov said after the game.
“The belief was always there and always will be there, no matter how much we are down. We are like a family and we fight like brothers. We love each other like brothers, so we have no reason to give up. We can only win from being here. When the last ball fell, I just wanted to go on my knees and just enjoy it, because the feeling was something that I can never even describe. I hope we can experience it again soon, in a couple of days. This is why we train, for this type of feeling.”
Earlier at the same venue, Czechia’s historic run at the World Championship continued unabated on Thursday after they qualified for the semifinals.
This is the first time that Czechia has qualified for the semifinals of a World Championship as a separate nation and it was befitting that they achieved it through a 3-1 (22-25, 27-25, 25-20, 25-21) comeback win over Iran on Thursday.
Star opposite Patrik Indra led Czechia with 22 points (20 kills, 2 aces) while his teammate outside hitter Lukas Vasina added another 21 points (19 kills, 1 block, 1 ace). Iran replied through outside hitters Poriya Hossein Khanzadeh Firouzjah and opposite Ali Hajipour MoghadDam FaroUji who both registered 18 points.
“I still don’t realize what happened. It will take some time for sure,” said Indra. “From the start of the game, we were under big pressure. We were about to lose the second set too, but the guys from the bench came in and decided that set to keep us alive. We did much better in the third and the fourth sets, but even when we were leading by seven points, the end of the game still felt so far.
I cannot find the words… We said to ourselves that the first game against Serbia would be important, but we were not thinking about qualification beyond the group. We wanted to show good volleyball, because we have really good players and a really good team. But we are not big stars yet, we were the underdogs, and it’s been like a fairy tale.”
The four semifinalists–Poland, Italy, Bulgaria and Czechia–will rest on Friday before returning to the SM Mall of Asia Arena on Saturday for the semifinals. The defending champions Italy will take on FIVB World Ranking leaders Poland while Bulgaria will face off with surprise package Czechia.
