2006 World Championships
Two Final Round tickets up for grabs for Asian men and European women (FIVB)
06/29/2005
June
29, 2005 – Know the true meaning of pressure? For three
men’s teams in Asia and four women’s sides in Europe,
this weekend’s two 2006 World Championship tournaments
are pressure personified.
In Chennai, India are joined by Korea and Australia in a
2006 Men’s World Championship playoff tournament, where
two tickets to the final round in Japan are on offer
while at the 2006 Women’s World Championship third round
tournament – Europe Pool G in Russia, the home side (ranked
6th in the world) will play Bulgaria (16th), the Czech
Republic (26th) and Azerbaijan (32nd) for two final
round places. Pic: Australia will compete with India and Korea for
two final round tickets in Chennai
It once again illustrates the superb competitive nature
of the FIVB’s premier tournament where the future of
seven teams’ 2006 World Championship future is on the
line.
In Asia, India (26th), Korea (10th) and Australia (22nd)
are all runner’s up in their respective second round
tournaments played earlier this month, where Kazakhstan,
China and Iran confirmed their places in the finals.
Following the playoff round robin tournament, which
starts on Friday, the top two sides will head to Japan,
while the third side can pack their bags, knowing their
World Championship campaign is over.
It is a similar round-robin format in Moscow, which will
determine the two sides to secure Final Round berths.
With two matches per day, the top two in the tournament
standings will rejoice, while for the third team, they
will enter a playoff for one extra ticket and for the
fourth team, their World Championship dream is over.
Russia and Bulgaria were automatically seed into the
third round while the Czech Republic and Azerbaijan have
advanced from the second round.
2002 world champions Italy, Germany and Serbia and
Montenegro are already confirmed as the first three in
the European contingent of eight vacancies in the final
round.
Turkey, the Netherlands, Ukraine and Belgium will play
off for two more spots while the final berth will go to
the winner of the play off.
