Mina Dragović: The matches with Hungary will be a great test before the final round of qualifiers

The Montenegrin women's volleyball team is coming to the end of its preparation period in Kolašin, where they have been intensively preparing for the final round of the European Championship qualifiers for 20 days.

Their first test awaits them on Saturday against the Hungarian national team, and the decisive matches in the fight for a place at EuroVolley are in August.

Coach Jovo Caković's team is working hard towards achieving their goal - qualifying for the European Championship.

Last year, in Latvia, our national team won a valuable point in a 3:2 defeat, and the duel with Bosnia and Herzegovina went to them with the official result. Therefore, the “reds” have a great opportunity to qualify for the European Championship for the first time in history. The duels with Hungary will be an excellent chance to check the current state of the team and identify the segments of the game that still need to be worked on.

Mina Dragović and her teammates will play their first official friendly match on Saturday at 18 pm at SC “Kolašin”, and will face the Hungarian national team, a rival known from the Golden League, three times in total through closed-door matches.

"After almost 20 days of preparation, I can say that we are training well and that as a team we are maintaining a stable level. We continued where we left off in June, and now we have a stronger squad, which gives me additional confidence in achieving the goal that lies ahead. In the coming days, we will have friendly matches against the Hungarian national team, which will serve as an excellent indicator - both of what is already working well, and of the segments that we still need to work on. The atmosphere in the team is great, we have great desire and motivation, so I believe that in the coming period we will show a good game and take a step forward," said Dragović.

The Montenegrin team will play the first match of the final part of the European qualifiers on August 6 in Goražde against Bosnia and Herzegovina, while four days later, on August 10, they will host the Latvian team in the sports hall in Kolašin, starting at 19 p.m.

The winners of seven groups, as well as the five best second-placed teams, will qualify for the tournament, which will be played in the summer of 2026 in Azerbaijan, the Czech Republic, Turkey and Sweden. In addition to the four host teams, the top-ranked teams – Serbia, the Netherlands, Italy, Poland, France, Bulgaria, Ukraine and Slovakia – secured their places through their placement at the previous EuroVolley.