Lube looking to find rhythm ahead of SuperLega playoffs

With only five weekends of the SuperLega Credem Banca regular season left, leaders Sir Safety Susa Perugia are the only team who have secured a place in the playoffs, which begin in March.

The 11 other sides in the SuperLega have goals that vary from avoiding relegation to finishing second in the standings before the start of the post-season. Defending champions Cucine Lube Civitanova are no different.

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The seven-time Italian champions are currently going through a difficult run of form, which saw them lose their last four matches, and they want to start turning things around on Sunday, when they face Top Volley Cisterna at home at 18:00 local time (17:00 UTC).

Lube are currently well above the playoff line, ranking fourth in the standings with 27 points (nine wins), but after collecting a single point in their last four encounters, they dropped from second to fourth place and saw the gap between them and the teams below them basically vanish.

The team coached by Gianlorenzo Blengini, which features the likes of Olympic champion Barthélémy Chinenyeze, world champions Fabio Balaso, Simone Anzani and Mattia Bottolo and Olympic medallist Luciano De Cecco, has the same number of points as fifth-placed Gas Sales Bluenergy Piacenza, and WithU Verona (24 points), Vero Volley Monza (23), Allianz Millano (23) and Cisterna (23) are all threatening to catch up.

If the Italian champions are able to top Cisterna 3-0 or 3-1 on Sunday, they will be able to build a seven-point lead over their opponents, who are the first team outside the playoff zone right now, but if they are on the losing side of the match, their gap could go down to a single point.

After tough losses to Valsa Group Modena, Monza and Trentino Itas, Lube displayed some signs of improvement last weekend, when they pushed Verona to five sets after trailing 2-0. They weren’t able to pull the win off, however, and have remained winless in the Italian League for more than a month now.

“We’ve been trying to be mentally ready to deal with difficult moments and improve on our weaknesses,” Blengini said after the match. “We managed to stay in the game, at times with player changes and in other moments just by being more patient, but we have to improve, to play better and to be more consistent, especially in transition.”

For the Italian champions, who are also participating in the CEV Champions League at this time of the season, clinching a playoff berth as quickly as possible and potentially improving their position in the standings is as important as returning to their best form.

“There are five rounds left before the end of the regular season and our main priority has to be on improving as a team and getting ready for the playoffs,” Ivan Zaytsev commented.

Sunday’s match will also be crucial for Cisterna’s plans. After winning only one of their last four matches, they could enter the playoff qualification zone with a victory over Lube. When the teams met in the first half of the season, in November, Cisterna won 3-0.

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