Budapest Futures: Ukraine and Bulgaria – Outsiders Rewriting History

"When the final whistle blew on the Budapest sand court, Ivan and Richard Likhatskyi embraced each other. They had just completed a remarkable journey from an opening pool loss to the championship, while the Ukrainian flag waved across the stands. Standing in the press area, I watched them and recalled a seasoned colleague's words: 'In the darkness of the press conference room, I learned to read between the questions.' For me, that Budapest evening was not just a match; it was a lesson in how a team rewrites its own story. Beach volleyball is often seen as a sport of powerhouses like Brazil, the USA, or Norway. But at the World Beach Pro Tour Futures – the entry-level tier of the FIVB professional tour – teams from Eastern Europe are quietly surging. Ukraine left Budapest with two medals: gold for the Likhatskyi brothers and bronze for Popov/Tiurin. Bulgaria also reached a Beach Pro Tour medal for the first time with silver. These results are not luck. The most striking part was the Likhatskyi brothers' journey. In their opening pool match, they lost to an underdog. Many would call that a sign of fragility. But a closer look reveals that the loss served as a test, allowing them to adjust tactics. Afterwards, they won five straight matches, defeating the in-form Bulgarian pair in the semifinals and the Austrians in the final. 'The night Japan collapsed was not a full stop, but a comma for them to write on.' I wrote that after the 2026 World Cup, and now it repeated before my eyes in a different sport, on a different court. We Vietnamese are used to focusing only on football, but beach volleyball holds equally valuable stories. I recall 2026, when the pandemic shut down all courts. I returned to Lam Dong to write about female players training on dirt fields, using rice bags as weights. They had no spotlight, but they had desire. In Budapest, I saw that spirit in the eyes of Ukrainian and Bulgarian hitters. They don't need glory; they need a fair stage. And when given the chance, they turned it into medals. Tactically, the Bulgarian pair of Mehandzhiyski and Kalchev displayed consistent power play. They won four straight matches before meeting Ukraine in the final. This is their best-ever result, surpassing a previous bronze at Sveti Vlas. Austria's Klemen and Holzinger reached the semifinals as fifth seeds but fell short – a solid yet not dominant performance. The real story is Ukraine's depth: besides the Likhatskyi brothers, Popov and Tiurin – with Tiurin on debut – secured bronze. Ukraine's beach volleyball is not a one-pair show. In my view, the counterintuitive insight many miss is that success at continental or world level comes not from a single star but from a system that produces multiple competitive pairs. Ukraine lacks Brazil's financial resources but invests systematically in youth. Tiurin's bronze proves that. Bulgaria's silver may attract further investment from its national federation. Looking at Vietnamese beach volleyball, we still have a long way to go. But the lesson from Budapest is clear: don't dream of leaps without building foundations. National teams need multiple pairs training together, fostering internal competition. More importantly, society's perception of the sport must change. Those silent women do not need glory; they need a society that knows how to see. We – sports writers – have a responsibility to bring them into the light. Finally, I want to emphasize: the silence of underdog teams is not agreement with being underestimated. It is a focus to prove themselves on the court. I write for those who have never appeared in sports pages, and today, they appeared with pride. For Ukraine and Bulgaria, Budapest Futures is just a comma in a long journey. For the volleyball world, it is a reminder that this arena never closes to those who dare to dream.