LDOG

To make sure Italy keeps playing in Italy and Bulgaria in Bulgaria regardless if they finished 1st or 2nd in their first round pool. Normally when there is only one host they distribute the teams in 2nd round like one group with: A1, B2, C1, D2. But with two hosts they want to make sure the local audience doesn't lose interest.

[hide] Knockout Round September 22nd - Ocotber 3rd, 2021 4 Nations, the Winners of each Semifinal will qualify for the Final, the Losers will play the Third-place Match Semifinals Date & Time (GMT +3) Nation 1 T1 T2 Nation 2 September 29th 2021, h. 20:00 Brazil 2 3 Argentina September 30th 2021, h. 20:00 Kazakhstan 1 2 Portugal [/hide]

I've already watched many japanese series/movies of this "death game" genre (which are quite a few) so I didn't fully experience the shock value or unpredictability (at some point you start to see the patterns in all these similar plots) but korean acting and characters are better than what you usually see in this type of thing.

Semifinals are set vs vs Iran is out after a spectacular 2nd half comeback from Kazakhstan.

[hide] Knockout Round September 22nd - Ocotber 3rd, 2021 16 Nations, the Winners of each Round of 16-matches will qualify for the Quarterfinals Round of 16 Date & Time (GMT +3) Nation 1 T1 T2 Nation 2 September 22nd 2021, h. 17:30 RFU 6 1 Vietnam September 22nd 2021, h. 20:00 Venezuela 2 3 Morocco September 23rd 2021, h. 17:30 Brazil 4 2 Japan September 23rd 2021, h. 17:30 Argentina 2 0 Paraguay September 23rd 2021, h. 20:00 Kazakhstan 4 1 Thailand September 24th 2021, h. 17:30 Uzbekistan 3 4 Iran September 24th 2021, h. 20:00 Portugal 2 1 Serbia September 24th 2021, h. 20:00 Spain 4 0 Czech Republic [/hide]

I was happy to see that goal called back in the last minute. Hate it when this behavior goes rewarded (like Spain in basketball or Brazil in volleyball in the past). I think our team will beat Paraguay handily (Argentina is stronger and they are weaker than what they were 5/6 years ago). I see all the favorites winning in R16 but IMO Serbia against Portugal is clearly the biggest chance of an upset.

Just 1 (rather unintentional) foul in the entire half says it all.

All 24 qualified teams for women's world championship confirmed. Hosts Defending champions CEV CSV Norceca CAVB AVC FIVB World Ranking

No no no, there are some teams you just don't trash talk before the game is over and much less with one day of anticipation Still, you have guts, I'll give you that.

They still haven't updated the ranking after the China win, but I already know 100% they will go above sorry

All 24 qualified teams confirmed. Host Defending champions CEV CSV Norceca CAVB AVC FIVB World Ranking

Qatar could beat Taiwan if they were to play. Same Australia. Well, they weren't given the opportunity to play against them and prove it (or disprove it). Korea attended this competition with a B team so that was a bit lucky for them. Of course, this is completely circumstantial and does not invalidate your criticism against the ranking system. Just wanted to point out that maybe, by chance, we'll have the stronger teams qualifying at the end.

Yes, it was embarassing to watch our players spike ball after ball to nowhere but it is what it is. Our Opposite and Outside Hitters are simply terrible players. It's a pity because the setter and blockers are good but they can't do so much to win without attack and good passing from the others. Even our coach admits in every interview that the team can't hope to beat anyone at big competitions and criticizes the players for having poor fundamentals from youth categories Poor man never coached women's vball before this job, he just took it because they don't want to pay decent money to anyone prestigious to coach a hopeless team.

It's not really surprising, we're missing 3 starters in the roster. And the team sucks anyway so they can lose to Colombia in any bad day even with the best players available. The real surprise was Colombia losing to awful Peru. Colombia will qualify through ranking, tomorrow's result doesn't matter to them except for getting a better medal. Argentina will also qualify through ranking (if it comes to that) as long as they don't lose to Chile, which would be ridiculous.

Maybe the substitutes will see more minutes but they will definitely play to win.

No wait until 2022. China and Japan have already been selected as the 2 asian quota through continental ranking. The others (Korea, Thailand, etc) will have to wait for world ranking qualification at the end of this week. Oh BTW african championship has been cancelled so african quotas will suffer the same fate.

Australia and New Zealand withdraw from both junior world cups and pro league 2021/22. Argentina already got the invitation as replacement team for junior women's world cup... so, everything back on track for us after so much bad luck.

I wonder why FIFA thought Lithuania, who have never even played a futsal euro and are probably the european country least attracted to kicking a ball in general, would be a good host for this event. The attendance seems to be poor even for the home team.

Why the hell do the 2 pools lead by the top 2 ranked teams have the same semifinal bracket for the winners? Is CAVB stupid?

First time watching any of these players... This girl Sakkari is JACKED, she has the body of a MMA female fighter.

They are missing Kosovo now but damnnn you're right, completely overlooked them so they beat Bulgaria by one (missing and ). I can't even do this simple game correctly. Surprisingly, Estonia have also played half of Conmebol already

Balakov was the coach, he resigned after the 0-6 + incidents vs England. I remember that somehow

You played them in last euro qualification... they beat you 2-3 in Sofia.

Correct! they have even played Venezuela despite they have never qualified for the world cup. Naturally, all national teams tend to organize friendlies with familiar nations (well, at least it used to be like that before money took over). They have also played almost all hispanic central american NTs.