The Bulgarian setter Simeon Nikolov gave his first interview in Russian after a match for his Lokomotiv Novosibirsk. This happened after the match from the last round of the regular season of the Russian Super League against Yaroslavich Yaroslavl, with the young national player speaking in a video published on Lokomotiv Novosibirsk's official channel on the Russian social network VK (VKontakte).

Although in still imperfect Russian, Nikolov himself commented on the match and his team's victory.

We are very happy that we returned and that we won. Well done to the team, I am very satisfied. The game against Yaroslavl was good, and I'm glad we won. This was the last match of the regular season, now the playoffs are coming. Yaroslavl is a good team, and this was a good test for us.

In his statement, the Bulgarian also mentioned the return of Belgian outside hitter Sam Deroo, who played his first match for 2026.

Sam is my friend. This was his first match for 2026, and I'm happy for him.

Nikolov also spoke about the next steps for Plamen Konstantinov's team before the start of the knockout phase.

Now we need to relax a bit and then start serious preparation for the playoffs.

Interestingly, this is the first time Simeon Nikolov has spoken Russian to the media. After Lokomotiv's previous match against Fakel Novy Urengoy, the Bulgarian setter gave an interview in Bulgarian, and his words were translated into Russian by Fakel's assistant coach – the Bulgarian Lazar Lazarov.

Evidently, the young national player is now taking his first steps in linguistic adaptation to the Russian championship, which is another sign of his quick integration into the team from Novosibirsk.