Yurii Semeniuk Named Ukraine’s Best Volleyball Player of 2025
Ukraine national team captain Yurii Semeniuk has been named the country’s best volleyball player for the second consecutive year.
According to the Ukrainian Volleyball Federation and sport.ua, which organised the poll, a record 100 respondents took part. They included 25 well-known experts, 25 coaches, 25 captains of national teams and clubs competing in Ukraine’s Super League, Higher League and First League, as well as journalists covering volleyball. Players received five points for each first-place vote, three for second place and one for third.
The individual voting results determined the 12 leading players. Fans then selected their favourites in a poll on the Ukrainian Volleyball Federation’s Telegram channel. A total of 4,226 fans voted. The most votes went to Oleh Plotnytskyi, a key player for Italian club Perugia, who earned 30 points towards the overall total through the online vote. Dmytro Yanchuk received 20 points for finishing second in the fan vote, while Vasyl Tupchii earned 10 points for third place.
In the final standings, two contenders — Dmytro Yanchuk and Vasyl Tupchii — finished level on points. Yanchuk was placed higher because more respondents ranked him first: 21, compared with 16 for Tupchii.
Meanwhile, Yurii Semeniuk was named Ukraine’s best volleyball player for the second year in a row. He appeared in the top three of more respondents’ lists than any other player — 63 in total, with 29 placing the national team captain first. Semeniuk topped the separate rankings among experts and team captains. Tupchii finished first among coaches, Yanchuk among journalists, and Plotnytskyi among fans.
Yurii Semeniuk had an excellent 2025. His club, Warsaw, finished the previous Polish PlusLiga season in third place and is currently sharing the lead with Lublin. In the club’s debut Champions League campaign, Warsaw reached the quarterfinals, where they lost to Türkiye’s Halkbank in the Golden Set.
In the summer, Semeniuk became the leading star of Ukraine’s national team during its first-ever Volleyball Nations League campaign. Ukraine narrowly missed out on the playoffs, finishing ninth, while the captain was statistically the tournament’s best blocker.
Ukraine’s Best Volleyball Players
2003 – Serhii Shchavynskyi
2022 – Oleh Plotnytskyi
2023 – Oleh Plotnytskyi
2024 – Yurii Semeniuk
2025 – Yurii Semeniuk
Below is the full ranking of Ukraine’s best players, along with the results of the individual voting in each category. Respondents mentioned a total of 37 volleyball players.
Overall Results: Ukraine’s Best Volleyball Player
Yurii Semeniuk (Warsaw, Poland) – 225 points (29 first-place votes, 23 second-place votes, 11 third-place votes)
Dmytro Yanchuk (Epicentr-Podoliany / Panathinaikos, Greece) – 176 points (21 – 12 – 15) + 20 fan-vote points
Vasyl Tupchii (Barkom-Kazhany) – 176 points (16 – 23 – 17) + 10 fan-vote points
Oleh Plotnytskyi (Perugia, Italy) – 148 points (17 – 10 – 2) + 30 fan-vote points
Vitalii Shchytkov (Epicentr-Podoliany) – 59 points (5 – 8 – 10)
Oleksandr Boiko (Epicentr-Podoliany) – 24 points (1 – 4 – 7)
Volodymyr Sydorenko (Epicentr-Podoliany) – 20 points (2 – 1 – 7)
Maksym Drozd (Epicentr-Podoliany) – 17 points (0 – 5 – 2)
Illia Kovalov (Barkom-Kazhany) – 16 points (1 – 2 – 5)
Mykhailo Yakushenko (MHP-Ladyzhyn) – 9 points (1 – 1 – 1)
Vitalii Sukhinin (Politsiya Okhorony / Reshetylivka) – 9 points (1 – 1 – 1)
Mykola Rudnytskyi (Zhytichi-Polissia) – 9 points (0 – 2 – 3)
Dmytro Zhorniak (Bakhmut-SHVSM) – 6 points (1 – 0 – 1)
Denys Popov (Boyarka) – 5 points (1 – 0 – 0)
Mykyta Luban (Zhytichi-Polissia / Epicentr-Podoliany) – 5 points (1 – 0 – 0)
Nik Sotnyk (Reshetylivka) – 5 points (1 – 0 – 0)
Yurii Matviienko (Continental) – 5 points (1 – 0 – 0)
Danylo Uryvkin (Epicentr-Podoliany) – 3 points (0 – 1 – 0)
Stanislav Zalisko (Bakhmut-SHVSM / Lokomotyv-1945) – 3 points (0 – 1 – 0)
Serhii Mishchenko (MHP-Ladyzhyn / Epicentr-Podoliany) – 3 points (0 – 1 – 0)
Oleksandr Nonin (Reshetylivka-2) – 3 points (0 – 1 – 0)
Ruslan Chervatiuk (Epicentr-Podoliany – U20 national team) – 3 points (0 – 1 – 0)
Yurii Synytsia (Sporting, Portugal) – 2 points (0 – 0 – 2)
Yevhen Boiko (Reshetylivka) – 2 points (0 – 0 – 2)
Viktor Shapoval (Zhytichi-Polissia / Epicentr-Podoliany) – 2 points (0 – 0 – 2)
Oleksandr Nalozhnyi (Epicentr-Podoliany) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Andrii Storozhenko (Continental) – 1 point (0 – 1 – 0)
Yevhen Hontarovskyi (Bakhmut-SHVSM) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Viacheslav Koltko (Reshetylivka-2) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Denys Kopych (Burevisnyk-SHVSM / Continental) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Valerii Todua (Będzin, Poland / Benfica, Portugal) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Horden Brova (Zhytichi-Polissia / Lokomotyv-1945) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Volodymyr Ostapenko (Lokomotyv – Kharkiv Region team / Reshetylivka) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Eduard Shteryk (Epicentr-Podoliany – U20 national team) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Illia Polishchuk (MHP-Ladyzhyn) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Andrii Cheleniak (Epicentr-Podoliany – U20 national team) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
Yurii Halushchak (Bulava) – 1 point (0 – 0 – 1)
