Italvolley, semifinals with the United States

Italy-U.S.

Italy, USA, Poland and Japan, the top four of the Volleyball Nations League, prepare to face the semifinals scheduled for tomorrow at the Ergo Arena on the weekend that will award the medals of the intercontinental tournament now in its fifth edition and that saw Italy finish fourth in the 2022 Finals in Bologna. After a run of nine victories in the Preliminary Phase, a 3-0 victory in the Quarterfinals over Argentina propelled the Azzurri to the semifinals with the U.S., which had to struggle to overcome the France obstacle, beaten only at the tie break, with Andreson scoring 22 points, followed by Jaeschke and Defalco. Among the Azzurri, in the clear victory against Argentina, Michieletto’s 15 personal points stand out, but above all the fact that they were able to keep their concentration high without ever giving Argentina a chance to react, an analysis confirmed by Coach De Giorgi in the post-match.

In the 88 challenges, there are 49 Azzurri victories over the United States while in the last match, just in this Volleyball Nations League, the USA won 3-0 in Ottawa, Canada.

The path traced by Italy in this first part of the season, presenting the semifinal with the USA, with an eye on the whole season as well, was told by one of the “veterans” of this group, Daniele Lavia: “We have conquered this semifinal that will be nice to play. All semifinals are complicated, this one even more so because the U.S. is a strong team, difficult to face. We’ve been on a three-week journey, we’ve changed a lot, we’re coming with more awareness in our means, we’re going to try to put our best foot forward. We are at the beginning of a long journey, we have been working for a month all together, in a somewhat discontinuous way having so many games to face, but these have allowed us to improve the mechanisms of our game. The summer is long, there is a lot to do, we have the strength to try to improve and fight for all the goals. I consider myself a “young man,” but certainly our task is also to help the new recruits get into this group. I consider ours to be a simple group that has a desire to be well together. We, with more time within this group, try to help the newcomers in the approach to training, to games, even a simple advice I think can help. We try to do our best to try to integrate everyone as best as possible. The group is the strength of this team, we are good together, we work well, everyone wants the best for each other, we try to give our best every time we are called upon, and that definitely helps everyone.”