European League 2008

will women european league start? ı heart something about that,do you know if it is ture or not?

From the CEV site

A kick-off meeting took place in Luxembourg last Saturday in order to define and set up a general framework for the organization of the upcoming 2008 European League.

The meet was headed by CEV President, Mr André Meyer, along with Mr Jan Hronek, CEV Vice-President, and ESOC’s President, Mr Pierre Mulheims. It was attended by 10 National Federations, namely Austria, Belarus, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovakia and Slovenia. Turkey, which is also going to enter that competition, was excused for not having the chance to attend the meet.

CEV President André Meyer opened the session by analyzing and evaluating the outcomes of the previous edition held in 2007. Even though in some countries attendance still has to be improved, he stressed that the 2007 European League enjoyed a great and successful impact, especially as far as media coverage and TV broadcasts are concerned.

As for the 2008 edition, Mr Meyer stated that it is going to remain as a sort of milestone as for the first time Great Britain expressed its willingness to join that competition and it will also enter it as a unified team as a result of a FIVB decision which allows the United Kingdom to play as a unified team in order to prepare for the next 2012 London Olympics. Austria and Belarus, which are also going to join the European League for the first time, were warmly welcomed by Mr Meyer; their entry proofs that the European League is enjoying an increased attention amongst the national federations and fulfilling the real purposes this competition has been conceived for.

As for the schedule of the 2008 edition, its definition results from a previous careful analysis and evaluation, especially as all the delegates realized that the sport events calendar for the upcoming summer is going to be pretty though and any overlap with other major competitions - such as the European Soccer Championships – has to be avoided.

As for the competition format, the National Federations agreed upon a change in comparison with last year’s edition in order to ensure an effective media coverage for the above mentioned reasons and the 2008 European League is therefore going to be played as a tournament.

Five legs have been scheduled as follows:

1st leg: June, 13th 15th

2nd leg: June, 20th 20th

3rd leg: June, 27th 29th

4th leg: July, 4th 6th

5th leg: July, 11th 13th

The final four will be played from the 19th to the 20th of July 2008 and its venue still has to be confirmed.

Even though Slovenia still has to officially confirm its participation, two pools have been arranged for the 2008 European League:

Pool A: Slovakia, Greece, the Netherlands, Portugal and Great Britain.

Pool B: Turkey, Germany, Slovenia, Austria and Belarus.

The definitive calendar of the 2008 European League will be confirmed as soon as all the National Federations involved will have submitted to the CEV the official agreements that are needed for entering that competition. The final deadline for the submission of these papers is the 15th of March 2008.

So, UK participate alltogether, I mean "Great Britain", so now chance for Scotland, Wales or Northend Ireland to have teams? And what happened with teams like Chezh Republic and Croatia, they are pretty good, why they are not in the list?

Scotland, England and N. Ireland already have teams.

Scotland men are playing in the European Championships Small Countries Division qualification round in Malta 06/06/2008 - 08/06/08 and will face Cyprus, Iceland and Malta. The other round is in Luxembough 20/06/08 teams in round are Luxembourg, Faroe Islands N. Ireland and San Marino. The top two from each round then go into the finals in Luxembough 2009 (host team qualify automatically) with the winners of the final round winning the right to play in the 1st round of the European Championships.

Scotland women are also playing in the European Championships Small Countries Division.

I can keep you up dated with the results of the Small Countries Division Qualification, if anyone is interested in them, I can't see Scotland doing to well as all out best players are now in the GB programme.

It's interesting who will win this league, maybe Germany, I think Ntetherlands also have chances, I don't know the level of Greece, but I doubt that they'll win the tournament.

In my opinion Germany and Netherlands are favourites, but if Germany win qualif. tournament in May maybe some players get free and won't be play in EL. But as I wrote IF

but you forget TURKEY.turkey giving important for this tournament

today first round of European League 2008 starts in Slovakia...

first matches Slovakia - GB and Netherlands - Greece

does anybody know if ANY TV channels broadcast the todays game ??

Today's matches, nope.
http://www.cev.lu/mmp/online/w…pean_league_1st_leg.1.pdf

GREECE THE NETHERLANDS 2 : 3 25:18 25:22 32:34 20:25 13:15

its a little bit surprise for me , because oranje played without Tromel,Bontje,Kooistra,Freriks,Horstink
ok greece also miss some important players , but anyway i thought it will be very clear win
specially after very strong first two setsof greek

SLOVAKIA GREAT BRITAIN 3 : 0 25:12 25:15 25:16 -
no problem for host of this first tournament
clear win,
i think they will win also agains greece and netherlands

Quote from Marsia

Today's matches, nope.
http://www.cev.lu/mmp/online/w…pean_league_1st_leg.1.pdf

i wonder which Slovak channel will show todays games... as it is written in that pdf...

Pool A (leg 2)
Slovakia - Netherlands 1 : 3 (20:25 25:17 19:25 21:25) stats
Portugal - Greece 0 : 3 (22:25 23:25 17:25) stats
Portugal - Slovakia 2 : 3 (25:19 21:25 25:22 21:25 13:15) stats
Greece - Netherlands 2 : 3 (21:25 20:25 25:19 25:21 15:17) stats
Today:
Netherlands - Portugal
Greece - Slovakia

Pool B (leg 1)
Germany - Austria 3 : 2 (22:25 25:20 25:19 20:25 15:10) stats
Belarus - Turkey 3 : 2 (25:22 22:25 25:23 16:25 15:12) stats
Today:
Turkey - Germany
Austria - Belarus

Pool A
Netherlands - Portugal 3 : 0 (25:22 25:19 25:22) stats
Greece - Slovakia 3 : 0 (25:22 25:22 25:21) stats
Ranking
1 NED Netherlands 6 6 0 12
2 GRE Greece 6 3 3 9
3 SVK Slovakia 6 3 3 9
4 POR Portugal 3 0 3 3
5 GBR Great Britain 3 0 3 3

Pool B
Turkey - Germany 3 : 1 (12:25 25:23 25:23 25:20) stats
Austria - Belarus 2 : 3 (25:27 24:26 25:21 25:20 15:17) stats
Today:
Turkey - Austria
Belarus - Germany

Quote from Justyna

Today:
Turkey - Austria
Belarus - Germany

Turkey - Austria 3 : 1 (25:22 23:25 25:17 25:23) stats
Belarus - Germany 3 : 2 (25:21 25:22 16:25 23:25 21:19) stats
Ranking
1 BLR Belarus 3 3 0 6
2 TUR Turkey 3 2 1 5
3 GER Germany 3 1 2 4
4 AUT Austria 3 0 3 3

Table after todays game

1. SVK 9 6 3 15

2. NED 6 6 0 12

3. GRE 9 3 6 12

4. GBR 6 2 4 8

5. POR 6 1 5 7

So far the level of the matches I've seen of this tournament has left something to be desired. The german team is young, but they really make an enormous amount of mistakes. It's cool to see Bakumofski playing a leadership role though. Turkey isn't playing too well either (except for their opposite, he's a fairly strong player). I didn't expect much from belarus and I guess my expectations were correct. I mean it's still cool to watch, but when you compare it to the World League, the difference is HUGE! I haven't seen any matches of the other pool though. I'm sure Holland puts up a decent level, even though we're also playing with out second team.. but our second team has got some serious talent.

POOL B
Turkey - Austria 1 : 3 (25:22 19:25 20:25 18:25) stats
Belarus - Germany 1 : 3 (23:25 17:25 25:23 18:25) stats
Turkey - Belarus 3 : 2 (19:25 25:21 25:20 23:25 17:15) stats
Germany - Austria 3 : 0 (26:24 25:18 27:25) stats
Austria - Belarus 0 : 3 (18:25 21:25 18:25) stats
Germany - Turkey 3 : 0 (25:18 25:10 25:21) stats

Ranking
1. Germany 17
2. Turkey 15
3. Belarus 15
4. Austria 13

Last leg will be played in Austria
11.07.2008 18:00 Germany - Turkey
11.07.2008 20:30 Austria - Belarus
12.07.2008 18:00 Turkey - Belarus
12.07.2008 20:30 Germany - Austria
13.07.2008 18:00 Belarus - Germany
13.07.2008 20:30 Austria - Turkey

Quote from Justyna

POOL B
Turkey - Austria 1 : 3 (25:22 19:25 20:25 18:25) 12.07.2008 20:30

Who come? I know, that Turkey isn't the best, but losing to Austria...