The new rising star in the women’s volleyball sky, the Russian-born Ekaterina Antropova, is at crossroads when it comes to her international career.
Antropova left for Italy at the age of 15 and now plays for a top club in the country, Savino Del Bene Scandicci. An 18-year-old opposite hitter was the top scorer of the Italian second division last season, averaging 24 points. Currently, Antropova’s career is on hiatus due to bureaucratic delays.
In Italy, they consider her their own because she received her first professional player’s license in the Apennines, therefore, she is not considered a foreigner. However, when Antropova applied for the CEV Challenge Cup, it turned out that she was once part of the expanded roster of the Russia U17 National Team for the CEV European Championship (she didn’t play a minute there) and a certain SDUSHOR was indicated as her club at that moment. In Russia, SDUSHOR is children and youth sports school that exists in practically every city. In Italy, they fear now that in Russia there will be some document that will make Antropova a foreigner, which will cause a lot of problems for Scandicci, up to and including technical defeats. Children and youth schools in Russia don’t issue licenses to 15-year-old players and even when Antropova left for Italy, there were no encumbrances from the All-Russian Volleyball Federation (VFV). But now Russia has an interest in Antropova, who has grown in Italy into a serious player with great prospects.
The main question is which national team will Antropova play for? The volleyball player has not yet played for anyone and can choose. The Italian federation (FIPAV) keeps Antropova under control. On the other hand, in the spring, there was an invitation by Sergio Busato, the head coach of ‘Zbornaya’, to the training camp in Novogorsk, but then the club season in Italy was still going on and the player could not come. But, at the same time, nobody invited Antropova to the FIVB U18 World Championship in September.
