# Bulgaria men's national volleyball team

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 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.