Italian defensive specialist Fabio Balaso was with Volleyball Padua since 2012, but will be making a change this offseason and into 2018-2019 as he has been poached away by Volley Lube.
The move is a five-year signing by Lube, which will keep the 22-year-old – who turns 23 in October – with the club through the 2022-2023 season. It’ll be Balaso’s third stop after he started with the youth program of Trebaseleghe in 2010 and moved to the senior team in 2011. Then in 2012, he changed over to Padua where he won an Italian Serie A2 Cup in 2013-2014 and remained until this offseason.
“I will give the maximum and 100% for the team and the club. It’s my first experience in a top club and I want to be up to every situation,” Balaso said in an introduction to the team. “I’m sure it will be a beautiful experience in which we can take away so much satisfaction. I can play with the best athletes in the world and train with them, only this possibility makes me very proud.”
The 5’10” (178 cm) back row specialist also has been with the Italian National Team since 2015, winning bronze with the country at the U23 World Championship. He also got his first call-up to the senior team later that year and recently competed with the team at the 2017 FIVB World League. However, he is not on the week one roster for Italy in the Volleyball Nations League.
Volley Lube finished the most recent 2017-2018 season at 22-4 (64 points), good for second in the regular season of the Italian top division (Serie A1). They then went on a run in the postseason to the championship match before falling just short of the top spot in five sets to Perugia. A year prior though, they won both the Italian Championship and Italian Cup while finishing third at the CEV Champions League.
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