September 5, 2009. On day 4 of the 2009 CEV Men’s European Championships, Slovenia, Estonia, the Czech Republic as well as Turkey booked their ticket home as 4th ranked teams in their Pools. The other twelve squads move on to the Playoff Round, which will take place from Tuesday to Thursday in Istanbul and Izmir. In their last game of the tournament Greeks played against last ranked Slovenia. Even when the Slovenians dominated, the Greeks played great at the end of each set and deservedly celebrated finishing first in Pool C.
Andrea Giani
Andrea Giani (born April 22, 1970 in Naples) is an Italian coach and one of the best Italian volleyball players in the 1990s, winning three World Championships with his national team. He is 196 cm tall.
Even as a kid Andrea showed exceptional physical features. His father, Dario, was a rower who had taken part in the 1964 Summer Olympics for Italy. After having trained with the father, Andrea tried his luck as a football player.But, in 1985 the 14 year old Giani began his career as a volleyball player in the local team of Sabaudia, in the Southern Latium, where he lived. His exceptional qualities attracted attention from the two main volleyball club of Italy of the period: Panini Modena and Santal (later Maxicono) Parma.
Samuele Papi
When Samuele Papi was young, he often went to the sports arena in Falconara, a small citiy on the Adriatic sea which is not far from Ancona, middle Italy. At that time, Zorzi and Renan and other champions were the idols he looked up to. He played volleyball from the early morning until the afternoon and assisted as ball retriever during A-1 matches. Since Samuele is not very tall, nobody ever imagined him becoming a world star one day. But a few years later, at the age of 21, Julio Velasco brought him to the senior’s national team, which was shortly after he had left the team of Falconara from the second Italian league.
Nikola Grbic
If we can accept the fact that the setter is the brain of each volleyball team, then one can rightfully say about Nikola Grbic that he is the game’s ideologist of Serbia & Montenegro. No medal won by the “Blue Team” since 1995 was conquered without Nikola Grbic. The best player of Europe in 1997 grew up in a family already owning a medal, namely from the European Championships in 1975 in Belgrade. His father, Milo, universal player during his entire career, succeeded in pulling both of his sons, Nikola and his older brother Vladimir, into all secrets of volleyball. Even if they had wanted to, the Grbic juniors could not have wished for a better teacher. But the father was demanding.
Giba
This superstar’s full name is Gilberto Amaury de Godoy Filho, but he is much better known as Giba.
Giba is the best known player in one of the greatest volleyball teams ever, Brazilian men’s volleyball team from this decade. Giba may be the best player in Brazilian superb volleyball team and is a superstar among volleyball fans all over the world.
Giba is not only an excellent professional volleyball player, but also has passion, energy and charisma which make him lovable by the volleyball fans – and the power to inspire the whole Brazilian team to play its best.
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Luigi Mastrangelo
Luigi “Gigi” Mastrangelo (born 17 August 1975 in Mottola) is an Italian volleyball player. Standing at 202 cm, he plays as middle hitter/blocker for Stamplast Martina Franca.
His father Pietro always wanted his son to become a policeman, which was the family tradition and would ensure Luigi a regular income at the end of each month. But Luigi Mastrangelo, or better Gigi (now everyone simply calls him Mastro), had other plans.
He liked playing football near his house in Mottola, a little town of 20,000 citizens South of Italy. Being a very good defender and an enthusiastic supporter of Juventus Turin, everybody called him Brio, who is a strong and tall football player. But Gigi Mastrangelo, who chose shirt number 3 following his idol Antonio Cabrini, was growing day by day and found it increasingly hard to move as agile on the football pitch as his close friend Nicola Legrottaglie, who was born in Gioia del Colle. While Nicola continued dribbling the ball, Gigi made a decision and changed to volleyball.
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Goran Vujevic
Goran Vujević was born in Cetinje, Yugoslavia, 27th February 1973. He started his career in Partizan Belgrade when he was 17 and from the very beginning of his playing there, he seemed to be an extra good server. That’s when he has got his nickname Kvisko.
Kvisko was the mascot of a quiz in which, if Kvisko was used and the answer was correct, the competitor would gain double points. Goran has been given this nickname after many matches he would play as a substitute and then become the key player of the match.
He has played for Partizan for six seasons – from 1990/91. to 1995/96. After that, he’s played for Italian clubs Colmark Brescia and Conad Ferrara for a season each. This season (1998/99.) he plays for Olympiakos Athens where he’s coached by Zoran Gajić.
Bas van de Goor
Bas van de Goor was born on September 4, 1971. At the age of 22, he chose to play professional volleyball. The 2.09-meter tall Dutch guy quickly entered the national team.
He was a member of the Olympic gold medal Dutch volleyball team. Besides the Olympic gold medal his team also won the European Championship and the World League.
During his eight year stay in Italy he played for Modena and Treviso. His last three years he played in Apeldoorn, Netherlands for Piet Zoomers/D.
