After 29-year gap, Latvia's women's volleyball team returns to Europe's top stage

Latvia's women's volleyball national team is returning to the European Championship's main stage after a 29-year absence. The path to this point was far from smooth — not long ago the team endured a losing streak of 37 consecutive matches, and simply qualifying for the tournament once seemed like an unreachable goal.

The tournament opens with a tough test: Latvia's first match in Istanbul pits them against Turkey, the reigning European champion, ranked third in the world and playing in front of its home crowd. In the group stage, Latvia will also face teams such as Poland, Germany, Slovenia and Hungary, all ranked well above them in the world standings.

Considered the group's weakest side

To advance to the knockout rounds, Latvia needs to finish among the top four teams in its group. Based on world ranking positions, Latvia is seen as the group's underdog, but the team is no longer the one that used to pile up loss after loss just a few years ago.

According to Delfi, recent changes within Latvian volleyball have helped the national team grow from a hopeless situation to qualification for Europe's biggest tournament. The key question now is whether, in Istanbul, the team can take one more step forward — moving from mere participation to genuinely contending for a spot in the knockout stage.