Bulgaria men's national volleyball team

Bulgaria
Association	Bulgarian Volleyball Federation
Confederation	CEV
Head coach	Gianlorenzo Blengini
FIVB ranking	19 (as of 8 January 2025)
Uniforms
Summer Olympics
Appearances	8 (First in 1964)
Best result	(1980)
World Championship
Appearances	20 (First in 1949)
Best result	(1970)
World Cup
Appearances	4 (First in 1965)
Best result	(2007)
European Championship
Appearances	28 (First in 1950)
Best result	(1951)
	www.volleyball.bg (in Bulgarian)
Medal record
Olympic Games
World Championship
World Cup
European Championship
European Games

The Bulgaria men's national volleyball team represents the country in international competitions and friendly matches. It is controlled by the Bulgarian Volleyball Federation.

History

The team's achievements include winning the Balkan Championships in 1980, Runners-Up (1970) and Third Place (1949, 1952, 1986, 2006) at the World Championship. At the European Championships Bulgaria has one Runners-Up (1951) and four Third Place (1955, 1981, 1983, 2009) finishes. Bulgaria has also achieved Runners-Up at the 1980 Summer Olympic Games in Moscow. The team has one third place at the World Cup (2007) and five Semi-Final appearances in the World League (1994, 2004, 2006, 2012, 2013). The team's most significant recent results include earning Third Place at the 2006 World Championship, the 2007 World Cup and 2009 European Championship as well as achieving Runners-Up at the first European Games in 2015.

Bulgaria first took part in the World League in 1994. During the debut season in the tournament, the team went all the way to the semi-finals; led by players like Lubo Ganev, Dimo Tonev, Martin Stoev, etc. In the next four editions, Bulgaria took part but did not manage to surpass its prior performance by reaching fifth in 1995, eight in 1996, sixth in 1997, and seventh in 1998. Under the guidance of Milorad Kijac, the new wave of players including Teodor Salparov, Danial Mihaylov, etc. mixed well with the more experienced Evgeni Ivanov, Plamen Konstantinov, Nikolay Ivanov, Vladimir Nikolov, Hristo Tsvetanov to result in the fifth-place rank in 2003. The next year, once again under Kijac, the team played some impressive games and succeeded to tie its best performance of reaching the Semi-Finals. The team included more players from the Under-21 team that the previous year won a medal at the World Championships, such as Matey Kaziyski and Milushev. In 2005 with a new coach, Martin Stoev, the team finished as the fifth rank, followed by another tied best-ever performance of reaching the Semi-Finals in 2006, and another fifth rank in 2007. In 2011 Bulgaria qualified for first time in the Final Round after four years, they finished as the fifth rank. The 2012 Final Round was held in the newly opened Armeets Arena in Sofia, and the host reached the Semi-Finals once again.

Statistics

Olympic Games

1972 Munich — 4th place
1980 Moscow — Silver medal
Gunchev, Stoyanov, Zlatanov, Dimitrov, Tsanov, Dimitrov, Petkov, Todorov, Simeonov, Valtchev, Iliev, Angelov.
2012 London — 4th place
G. Bratoev, Skrimov, Dimitrov, V. Bratoev, V. Nikolov (C), Yosifov, Salparov, Todorov, Aleksiev, Penchev, N. Nikolov, Sokolov. Head coach: Naydenov

World Championship

1949 Czechoslovakia — Bronze medal
1952 Soviet Union — Bronze medal
1962 Soviet Union — 4th place
1970 Bulgaria — Silver medal
1986 France — Bronze medal
2006 Japan — Bronze medal
2010 Italy — 7th place
2014 Poland — 13th place
2018 Italy/Bulgaria — 11th place
2022 Poland/Slovenia — 20th place
2025 Philippines – Qualified

World Cup

1969 East Germany — 4th place
2007 Japan — Bronze medal

European Championship

1950 Bulgaria — 4th place
1951 France — Silver medal
1955 Romania — Bronze medal
1958 Czechoslovakia — 4th place
1963 Romania — 4th place
1981 Bulgaria — Bronze medal
1983 East Germany — Bronze medal
1995 Greece — 4th place
2009 Turkey — Bronze medal
2011 Austria/Czech Republic — 6th place
2013 Denmark/Poland — 4th place
2015 Bulgaria/Italy — 4th place
2017 Poland — 6th place
2019 France/Slovenia/Belgium/Netherlands — 11th place
2021 Poland/Czech Republic/Estonia/Finland — 11th place
2023 Italy/Bulgaria/North Macedonia/Israel — 15th place

World League

1994 — 4th place
1995 — 5th place
1996 — 8th place
1997 — 6th place
1998 Milan — 7th place
2003 Madrid — 5th place
2004 Rome — 4th place
2005 Belgrade — 5th place
2006 Moscow — 4th place
2007 Katowice — 5th place
2008 Rio de Janeiro — 7th place
2009 Belgrade — 10th place
2010 Córdoba — 7th place
2011 Gdańsk — 5th place
2012 Sofia — 4th place
2013 Mar del Plata — 4th place
2014 Florence — 8th place
2015 Rio de Janeiro — 10th place
2016 Kraków — 11th place
2017 Curitiba — 9th place

Nations League

2018 Lille — 11th place
2019 Chicago — 12th place
2021 Rimini — 15th place
2022 Bologna — 14th place
2023 Gdańsk — 15th place
2024 Łódź — 14th place

European Games

2015 Baku — Silver medal

Universiade

1961 Sofia — Silver medal
1977 Sofia — Gold medal

Team

Current Squad

The following is the Bulgaria roster^[1] in the 2024 FIVB Men's Volleyball Nations League

Head coach: Italy Gianlorenzo Blengini


No.	Player Name	Position
1	Simeon Nikolov	S
6	Georgi Petrov	OH
8	Asparuh Asparuhov	OH
9	Vladimir Garkov	OH
10	Denis Karyagin	OH
11	Aleks Grozdanov	MB
12	Georgi Tatarov	OH
13	Dimitar Dimitrov	O
14	Martin Bozhilov	L
16	Svetoslav Stankov	S
19	Nikolay Kartev	MB
22	Damyan Kolev	L
24	Iliya Petkov	MB
27	Boris Nachev	MB

Head coaches

1949–1950 – Valentin Ankov 1951–1952 – Dimitar Elenkov 1952–1955 – Georgi Krastev 1957–1958 – Dimitar Elenkov 1964–1971 – Dimitar Gigov 1971–1972 – Todor Simov 1979–1980 – Todor Piperkov 1980–1982 – Tsvetan Pavlov 1982–1983 – Vasil Simov 1984–1986 – Bogdan Kjuchukov 1991–1992 – Georgi Vasilev 1992–1994 – Stoyan Stoev 1994–1994 – Brunko Iliev 1994–1996 – Bogdan Kjuchukov 1996–1997 – Stefan Sokolov 1998–1999 – Georgi Vasilev 1999–2000 – Brunko Iliev 2000–2002 – Hristo Iliev 2002–2003 – Assen Galabinov 2003–2004 – Milorad Kijac 2004–2005 – Brunko Iliev 2005–2008 – Martin Stoev 2009–2010 – Silvano Prandi 2010–2012 – Radostin Stoychev 2012–2012 – Nayden Naydenov 2012–2014 – Camillo Placì 2014–2019 – Plamen Konstantinov 2019–2022 – Silvano Prandi 2022–2023 – Nikolay Jeliazkov 2023 – Plamen Konstantinov 2024–present – Gianlorenzo Blengini

Kit providers

The table below shows the history of kit providers for the Bulgaria national volleyball team.

Period	Kit provider
2002–2019	Asics
2019–	Erreà

Sponsorship

The main sponsor of the national team is the Bulgarian betting company efbet, while Asics, Mikasa and Lidl are secondary sponsors.^[2]

References

^ volleyballworld.com. "Bulgaria VNL 2024". volleyballworld.com. Retrieved 9 June 2024.
^ "Българска Федерация Волейбол". bvf.bg. Retrieved 8 September 2023.

External links

[1] volleyballworld.com. "Bulgaria VNL 2024". volleyballworld.com. Retrieved 9 June 2024.

[2] "Българска Федерация Волейбол". bvf.bg. Retrieved 8 September 2023.

[1]

[2]

v t e Men's national volleyball teams of Europe (CEV)
BVA (Sv)	Albania Bosnia and Herzegovina Bulgaria Greece Kosovo Malta Moldova Montenegro North Macedonia Romania Serbia Turkey
EEVZA (Pl)	Armenia Azerbaijan Belarus Estonia Georgia Latvia Lithuania Poland Russia Ukraine
MEVZA (Sv)	Austria Czech Republic Cyprus Croatia Hungary Israel Slovakia Slovenia
NEVZA (Sv)	Denmark England Finland Faroe Islands Greenland Iceland Norway Sweden
WEVZA (Sv)	Belgium France Italy Germany Netherlands Portugal Switzerland Spain
SCA (Sv)	Andorra Faroe Islands Gibraltar Greenland Ireland Iceland Liechtenstein Luxembourg Malta Monaco Northern Ireland San Marino Scotland Wales
Defunct	Czechoslovakia East Germany Serbia and Montenegro Soviet Union Yugoslavia Great Britain (Inactive)