Greece ends up second in volleyball’s Silver European League

The men’s national volleyball team did well to reach the final of the Silver European League, successfully graduating from the group stage, but fell short of snatching promotion to the Golden European League.

The team coached by Dimitris Andreopoulos confirmed its improvement in the last couple of years, combining experience with youth, to make the home-and-away finals with Romania for the ticket to the top level of the European League.

However Romania managed to beat Greece in Piraeus last week with a 3-2 score and seal its ticket to the upper echelon of the league with a 3-0 win on Sunday at home, although the Greek players had some serious complaints about the second leg’s officiating.

“Our presence in the final was a success, but that would have been greater had we won the gold medal,” said Greece setter Dima Filippov. “The advantage has been the entry of new faces such as [Alexandros] Raptis, [Giorgos] Papalexiou, [Thodoris] Voulkidis and [Dimitris] Mouchlias; this is a great prospect for the future,” he added.

The national team is now setting its sights on its return (after a decade) to the European Championship finals taking place in September, with a chance to avenge those defeats to Romania, as the two teams are in the same group.