The national champion in volleyball, Maccabi Tel Aviv, will host tomorrow at 19:00 (live on 5PLUS) PAUK Thessaloniki, the cup holder in Greece, in the first of two matches, in the round of 16 of the European Challenge Cup. The return match will take place in Thessaloniki on December 15. The champion knows that it will not be an easy task, but she will try to get an advance.
“The Greek opponent is a much stronger team than the ones we meet in the Israeli league,” the coach Cylindrical wave He said, “We are coming to the game with PAUK Thessaloniki after an important victory over Meta Asher (1:3) and we are definitely focused and highly motivated to succeed. This is a game that the players love very much and have been working for for a whole year. We need our individual and team ability to come together. I believe that with A supportive crowd and our good game, we can win.”
Gennady Sokolov, captain of Maccabi Tel Aviv, sounded excited: “We are playing against a strong team but we are coming to win. We studied them well and the game plan was built accordingly. We believe we can win. We go into the game determined to succeed. We made a perfect professional preparation and we all think we have the tools to win. Of course we expect our wonderful crowd to push us throughout the game. The audience plays an important role in this game.”
The visiting team from Greece, ranked second in the league at this stage of the season, will arrive in Israel on Wednesday. Four foreign players play in its ranks: its outstanding player is Bram van den Dries, a player of the Belgian national team, Bart Walsh, a player of the Canadian national team, and a player from Brazil and a player from the Netherlands. In addition, PAUK Thessaloniki has four players who are on the Greek national team.