Brizitka-Molnar
Charlotte Leys – MVP at the European League Finals this past July in Varna – will be one of the players Belgium will showcase in Zurich while Judith Pietersen is about to carry the Dutch hopes in Halle/Westfalen. Zuzanna Efimienko is one of the players nominated by Poland’s head coach Piotr Makowski for this European Championship while Brizitka Molnar will go for a second consecutive title after she won gold two years ago in Belgrade with Serbia.
Serbia stands as the pre-favorite in Pool D where the bronze medalists from the 2013 FIVB World Grand Prix Finals will play Poland, Bulgaria, and the Czech Republic.
“Serbia has set very high goals for this Championship and we want to achieve the same we did two years ago” Molnar says. After playing in Istanbul last year, she was transferred to Atom Trefl for the coming season.
“Poland is a strong team and with good players though they did not perform as they wished in the World Grand Prix” she continues.
Serbia has travelled to Germany and namely to Schwerin, venue of pool D, almost straight from Japan where the team finished third at the World Grand Prix Finals in Sapporo, with Brazil and China settling for first and second place there.
“Even though the Grand Prix Finals were that close to the start of the European Championship, there’s nothing to do about that. Elite Volleyball players are used to busy schedules and I think this is not going to affect our performance at the European Championship” Molnar explains.
Some months ago head coach Zoran Terzic decided to include Molnar on the group set to play the World Grand Prix and this year’s European Championship and through the past few weeks Brizitka has showed she did deserve that privilege. “We played strong in the World Grand Prix but nevertheless think we could have done even better. I have played some games but keep on working hard to improve”.
Judith Pietersen (NED) and Charlotte Leys (BEL) will also celebrate their European debut on Friday as their teams play Turkey and France respectively in Halle and Zurich. The “Oranjes” were assigned to a very strong group including also hosts Germany and Spain while Belgium is set to take on Switzerland and Italy in the next couple of days.
To read more news from this competition click on European Championship 2013 W.
