I was astonished by these three teams that unexpectedly rose their levels.
-Serbia didn't play well till the WCH 06. I remember them playing without stability two months before at the WGP qualification (even if a clue back then was them beating Turkey at the tie break). At WCH they beat Poland, Turkey, Cuba and twice Italy. They took a set Brazil.
-USA wasn't really an elite team in the 2005-2008 period. I remember them losing against the top teams. They didn't qualify for the WGP 06 and 07 and fared quite badly at the 08 WGP. But they rose their level at the Olympics.
-Korea is a real surprise. I mean: they beat China at the 2010 WCH, but at the last WC and at WGP they were quite disastrous. Now they beat Brazil 3-0, Serbia and Italy 3-1, lost just at the tie break with China and Turkey.
It was possible in your opinion to predict that rise? Can you predict which team could possibly surprise us in the future?
Other teams are more gradual in their rise (Thailand and Germany for example).