site.btaUPDATED Bulgaria Goes to Semifinals at Volleyball Men’s World Championship

Bulgaria’s national men's volleyball team won dramatically after a comeback 3-2 (21-25, 19-25, 25-17, 25-22, 15-13) against the US and qualified for the semifinals of the 2025 FIVB Volleyball Men’s World Championship on Thursday night in the Philippines. Bulgaria reached the final four of the World Championship for the first time since 2006, when they won bronze medals in Japan. 

Bulgaria started with its main lineup: Simeon Nikolov, Martin Atanasov, Asparuh Asparuhov, Aleksandar Nikolov, Alex Grozdanov, Iliya Petkov, and libero Damyan Kolev. Georgi Tatarov came on as a substitute during the match.

The Americans took a 7-4 lead early in the first set and then managed to maintain their strong start, bringing the score to 20-16. A final upsurge by the Bulgarian team failed to change the course of events, and the US took the set 25-21.

At the start of the second set no one prevailed, but the Bulgarians fell behind again 13-16 and 16-21, allowing the American team to take the lead 25-19.

The third set started with a 6-2 lead for Bulgaria. The stable performance in attack of the team led by coach Gianlorenzo Blengini continued and the score became 17-13. After 25-17, the Bulgarians remained in the match, taking advantage of mistakes in the US team.

The game went point for point with both teams scoring alternately, throughout the fourth set. The score came to 22-22, but the next three points were won by the Bulgarian team who reached a tiebreak.

In the last set, the Bulgarian team showed character and built up a 6-3 and 9-5 lead, but the US came back into the game at 11-9. Bulgaria had four match points at 14-10, but the Americans managed to close the gap to 14-13 after a successful video review. The final 15-13 came after Iliya Petkov’s successful attack.

Aleksandar Nikolov finished with 29 points for the Bulgarian team, and Asparuh Asparuhov added another 12. Ethan Champlin scored 17 points for the US.

In Saturday's semifinals, Bulgaria's team will play against Czechia. Earlier today, the Czechs defeated Iran 3-1.