Photo Credit: Ales Oblak/OZS
CEV, Luxembourg. Skopje (North Macedonia) and Maribor (Slovenia) will be playing host to the Final Four tournaments of the CEV European Silver League 2021! The eventual winners of these events will secure the right to participate in the 2022 edition of the European Golden League, thus moving a step closer to reaching the continental elite of the sport.
The Macedonian capital will be playing host to the Silver League Finals for the second time in history, after delivering the very first edition of the event back in 2018. The competition will be taking place from June 5-6 and feature the teams emerging on top from the group stage in Pool A and B, Team MKD as hosts as well as the best runner-up across the two preliminary pools.
Further to the decision to allot the Final Four hosting rights to Skopje, the schedule for the men’s League Round has slightly changed. The competition will be starting earlier than originally planned with tournaments in North Macedonia and Austria from May 21-23 in Pool A and B, respectively, followed by the second round of matches in Denmark and Luxembourg, whose programme remains unchanged.
After securing their second straight #EuroVolleyM appearance earlier this year, Team MKD will be hoping to improve on the result they achieved back in 2018 when they finished the Silver League in a disappointing fourth place. However, much has changed since those days, with Nikola Gjorgiev & Co. making history through their EuroVolley appearance in 2019, where they claimed two wins over Belarus and eventual silver medallists Slovenia. Back in January of this year, they finished their EuroVolley qualifier in second place, making sure they would be among the five runners-up to make the journey to the flagship continental event for national teams co-hosted later this year by Poland, Czech Republic, Estonia and Finland.
Slovenia will be hosting the women’s Finals in Maribor on June 11-12, 2021. After qualifying for EuroVolley 2019, where they exited the tournament in the 8th Finals after losing in straight sets to Germany, the young Slovenian team will be trying to prove themselves on home soil, improving on the silver medal they won in the 2019 edition of the Silver League. Back then, Slovenia lost to Romania in the finals – but only at the Golden Set.
Should Team MKD or Slovenia win their pool, both of the runners-up from the League Round will qualify for the Finals as well.
Many up-and-coming national teams very much look forward to competing on the international stage again – especially after the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic resulted in the cancellation of all ‘senior’ Volleyball competitions scheduled for the summer of 2020, including the European Golden and Silver Leagues.
News:
CEV – European Volleyball
OZS – Volleyball Federation of Slovenia
