Men's World Championship 2018

    Truthfully, I'm just bored that we're considered cheaters by default.

    And that's one of the reasons I suddenly and honestly underlined that it is possible we cheated on the sorting (and that Solé ball wasn't fault, for example :P). But again, one thing it's saying there is a possibility, another thing is a direct accusation.


    Of course you didn't call someone 'idiot' directly, but I wanted to point out (obviously by exaggeration, so it 'speaks out') that – even if you didn't realized it – your phrase implied that whoever didn't realized it was all made up it's an idiot.


    Anyway, I and other Italians agree that the sorting could have been organized better, that's why a checked for the previous one: to see if that one seemed to be better organized, which imho it doesn't (for example, even in that case the extraction wasn't at the same moment).

    OK you are a bit right, it's just the more I watch it the more I see it, I don't know... :/

    I'm Polish so I should appreciate this draw! So that's not a rage thing

    Quote from Kk15

    Truthfully, I'm just bored that we're considered cheaters by default.

    KK15 u should not waste your time ....I guess some people are just forgetting that Italy won Silver in the last 3 Major Tournaments ( World Cup, Olympics, Champions Cup). Do we need to back to the past what 5 or so Olympics that Italy has reached the semis?.....And none of these tournaments were held in Italy.


    Russia is this strong based on what?? Their VNL win?!! When was the last time they won a major tournament? 2012....Poland won something in 2014.


    I do not like this formula because is boring...and WCH should not be boring.... But Italy would be in the semis with or without help....They truly does not need any help...so yeah don`t even waste your time.... :*

    It's not that I don't understand it.. I'm just a bit pissed off that everybody thinks straight away about conspiracy.

    Just to say, I'm italian and italians is not always equal to cheating :whistle:

    Salve tutte e tutti, e particolarmente Diesse.

    Back here to follow the Women's World Championship. Dai Dai raga'

    I wish the following SF pairings: ITAxUSA, RUSxSRB. Sorry Poland and Brazil :win:

    Tournaments like this are ripe for conspiracy theories. Be it on collegiate level or international. Some people will always find something suspicious even out of the most mundane draw/selections especially if they feel like a host nation/team is getting a favorable draw. Having said that...they didn't really make it too difficult for people to question the legitimacy and fairness of this drawing. It's too amateur and quite frankly laughable. It's something you expect from a beer league and not from an international caliber tournament run by its very own international sports federation.

    something else that fivb changed was that in 2014, criteria to advance from first phase was points and not win-loss ratio. now they changed to win-loss ratio, ignoring points (FRA got screwed)... why keep changing???? and the format of 2nd round is just stupid. and as many have said, groups of 3 are too stupid...

    if teams were not to carry points from the first round France would have won the pool with 2 wins 7 points, Serbia 2 wins 5 points, Poland 1 win 4 points.


    A injured Canada the 4th place in Pool B took down the 2nd and 3rd (Iran, Bulgaria).. They probably would beat Poland also.


    Carrying points is not fair... But I wish that Serbia would have played to win against Poland as France deserved the Final 6. I still want Serbia to win it all but I won't feel bad if they end up loosing for Poland again.... Karma is a B.

    I watched the YouTube video and it’s obvious that it’s an act of deception from the Italian representative drawing the pool assignment. I’m not surprised, though, after 2010 WCh. The competition formula in 2010 and this year are meticulously designed to help Italy reach the Final Six.

    Quote from 85dany18

    i'm italian and im not shuffler...why you say this? i think that Pol-Ser is strange.....

    I’m not telling it about you, because Italians as a nation are one of the most likeable (and according to surveys - the most liked by Poles) but when Italian volleyball federation get some event to organize, they are able to turn the world upside down to organize the easiest way to success for their team. And this is the truth. WCH 2010 are proof of that. For me 2nd round of this year champs shows that it was planned to create the easiest way for the hosts to be in top6, but don’t want to argue with that now. Cheers!

    With 2014, how do you think Poland felt with the third round draw. Sure I’ll take Brazil and Russia in my pool? Just to reach the semifinals.


    The reason for the draw is to prevent loses on purpose. I think that they should have drawn the second place teams as well, but they were already slotted.


    With the change on points after 2014, it goes back to the Dominican Republic women. The swept the first round 5-0, but had 12 points, to Italy’s 4-1 and 13 points. Italy was first on points. Winning should be the most important thing and so it changed in 2015 that wins are most important and then points.


    At this stage all matches matter, you lose you go home.

    Quote from brahmin

    Winning should be the most important thing

    I agree, in this kind of competition. On longest competition like National Championship I'm still for the "point matters the most" version.


    Quote from brahmin

    At this stage all matches matter, you lose you go home.

    Unfortunately, if we are speaking of the formula that's not entirely true: the last match of each pool could theoretically be useless, if one of the other team had already lost both matches.

    Quote from Kk15

    I agree, in this kind of competition. On longest competition like National Championship I'm still for the "point matters the most" version.


    Unfortunately, if we are speaking of the formula that's not entirely true: the last match of each pool could theoretically be useless, if one of the other team had already lost both matches.

    Then (in the last match) you try to have... most "suitable" opponent in the semis and potentially weaker.

    Part of me wants Italy to be in the Gold medal match as the atmosphere was already amazing vs the Russia match so you could only imagine what it would look like. If Italy tops their pool (and Italy has good chances IMO), I want them to face USA in the semis. This will be a rematch of sorts mirroring Rio 2016 SF. Russia and Serbia will be my other SF pair. Brazil has already won many WCH titles, and Poland will be a different team next year with their savior Leon so they can say goodbye to this editiion :lol:

    Quote from vabo

    Japan started the tradition about a decade ago, come on... Yet nobody is calling Japanese cheaters and dishonest. The pools are closed, let's just enjoy the matches.

    Its only because nobody realizes that there is an japanese male volleyball national team. There are just to small and have zero chanches to archieve anything.


    Nobody said that Italy cheats EVERYTIME.

    But 2010 and 2018 (+ lottery manipulation) FIVB create stupid and unfair formulas to favour the host.

    Quote from Sillynameplus567

    Tournaments like this are ripe for conspiracy theories. Be it on collegiate level or international. Some people will always find something suspicious even out of the most mundane draw/selections especially if they feel like a host nation/team is getting a favorable draw. Having said that...they didn't really make it too difficult for people to question the legitimacy and fairness of this drawing. It's too amateur and quite frankly laughable. It's something you expect from a beer league and not from an international caliber tournament run by its very own international sports federation.

    If we compare this tournament to the FIFA world cup, this one is clearly a beer league.

    And we know that FIFA is full of corruption and FIFA world cup is full of refery mistakes in the "right direction".

    You could easily manipulate a lottery with warm balls, cold balls. We've seen lottery manipulations lot of times in FIVB tournaments.