Italy – Plotnytskyi: “we have to start again, and give everything to keep the tricolour in Perugia”

The new season is slowly taking shape in Perugia. The first full week of preparation is underway for the five Block Devils who returned to the PalaBarton last Wednesday, with the coaching staff gradually increasing both the intensity and the workload.
Morning sessions are focused on preventive work in the gym, while the afternoons are dedicated to technical and tactical training on the court.

The plan is deliberately progressive. The players who began pre-season from day one are being prepared as thoroughly as possible for the arrival of their teammates currently away with their national teams. And, as has become customary in Perugia, that means more than half of the roster is currently wearing the jersey of its country.

Among the “excused absences” is Oleh Plotnytskyi, who has returned to the Ukrainian national team after missing out on some international commitments in previous summers. For the Ukrainian outside hitter, the summer has already provided plenty to celebrate, with Ukraine reaching the VNL Finals for the first time in its history.

“The summer is going very well. We qualified for the VNL Final Eight for the first time, we played a couple of really good matches and now we have started preparing for the European Championship. Then we’ll see. When we finish the European Championship, I’ll return to Perugia.”

That return will mark the beginning of his eighth consecutive season in the club’s jersey. He joined Perugia in the 2019/20 season, still only just over 20 years old, and has since grown into one of the most experienced figures in the squad and a genuine veteran of the dressing room.
His role will be particularly important this season, with Perugia welcoming several young players. Alongside Kamil Semeniuk, he will once again form a well-established attacking partnership, while the wing-spiker will also have two new and highly promising teammates: France’s Mathis Henno and Iran’s Matin Hosseini, both 21 and both preparing to make their Italian league debuts.

“The new group has become even younger, and that is a good sign. Personally, I don’t know the other players in my position yet, but I’ve watched them a little and I think they deserved the call from Perugia because they have shown a good level of volleyball and that they can become top players in the future!”

For Plotnytskyi, however, integrating new players into Perugia’s environment should not be particularly difficult. The strength of the dressing room has traditionally been one of the club’s greatest assets, and building that sense of belonging will once again be essential.

“I think, first of all, the atmosphere in the dressing room is very important. In our dressing room it has always been good, and I think that makes it easier for us to integrate the new players into the team and get to know them better, while also allowing them to show us who they are. As always, we try to build our ‘circle’ as quickly as possible with the new players, bring them into our circle and move forward together.”

That collective mentality will be tested immediately. Perugia enter the new campaign as the reigning champions of everything they could possibly win last season, but the domestic competition has certainly not stood still. The major Italian clubs have all strengthened their rosters and, just like Perugia, are targeting an improvement on the previous campaign.

Plotnytskyi knows there will be little room for complacency.

“I think that in Italy it’s always like this, especially in recent years. Every team wants to improve, wants to achieve better results than the previous year and wants to improve as a team. That is a very good thing for the league, but it will be difficult, as always. As I said before, we have to build our ‘circle’ in the right way as quickly as possible. Then we know there are also our opponents, but I think the staff and Angelo know what we need to improve and what we need to do. We have to give everything and follow their ideas as well as possible!”

When Plotnytskyi eventually returns to Perugia, he will also find something familiar waiting for him on the court: the Italian tricolour that now proudly covers the parquet after last season’s extraordinary success.

It is a sight he has already experienced, but one that has lost none of its emotional impact.

“Of course it’s a source of pride, because last year we did a great job, but we know very well that it is already history. I think the first thing I’ll want to do when I arrive in Perugia is go onto the court and lie down in the middle of it, just as I did the first time, when we won three years ago! Our arena has become even more beautiful with this tricolour, and we want to give everything we can to try to keep it in Perugia once again!”

There is something particularly revealing in those words. Plotnytskyi is proud of what Perugia achieved last season, but he is already looking beyond it. Winning every competition available — in Italy, Europe and on the international stage — is an extraordinary accomplishment, but for a team with Perugia’s ambitions, yesterday’s trophies cannot become tomorrow’s comfort zone.

The Ukrainian veteran embraces the club’s new-season mantra with a remarkably simple philosophy: start again.

“I think everything we won is a beautiful thing. It doesn’t happen very often, it doesn’t happen to everyone, and we can be very proud of our work and what we achieved. But yes, we have to start working even harder again! I think the important thing is to improve, even if it’s by five or ten percent, or hopefully even more. The important thing is to improve, and then we’ll see. Another year in which we play every possible competition is a beautiful thing. It doesn’t happen to everyone. For us, it is happening for two consecutive years, and it is something fantastic to represent Perugia in every possible competition throughout the season for the club.”

And perhaps that is the most fitting way to describe Perugia’s challenge. The trophies have already been won, the tricolour is already on the floor and the history books have already been updated. But none of that guarantees anything when the new season begins.

For Plotnytskyi and the Block Devils, the circle has to be rebuilt, the newcomers have to become part of it, the rivals have to be faced and the work has to start all over again.

Source: Sir Susa Scai Perugia Press Release.

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