FIVB Men’s Challenger Cup: Portugal Wins Pool A; Cuba Also Clinches Semis Bid

2018 FIVB MEN’S CHALLENGER CUP:

• June 20-24, 2018
• Matosinhos, Portugal

FORMAT:

• What’s on the line?
  • The winning team of the tournament will get to face the lowest ranked challenger team from the 2018 FIVB Men’s Volleyball Nations League.
    • Whichever team wins that match will make the 2019 FIVB Men’s Volleyball Nations League
• Six teams are split into two pools (three in each)
  • The six are made up of the host nation (Portugal), South American qualifier (Chile), Asian qualifier (Kazakhstan), North American qualifier (Cuba) and Golden European League qualifiers (Estonia & Czech Republic)
  • The top two teams from each three-team pool will move on to the semifinals
    • Pool A#1 vs. Pool B#2 & Pool B#1 vs. Pool A#2

RESULTS:

Pool A:

• World Rankings: #30 Portugal, #32 Estonia, #35 Kazakhstan

PORTUGAL DEF. KAZAKHSTAN 3-0

• Portugal def. Kazakhstan 3-0 (25-23, 25-19, 25-16)
• Portugal improves to 2-0; Kazakhstan falls to 0-2

The Portuguese side wrapped up the Pool A title in front of their home crowd by sweeping Kazakhstan. That sends them to the semifinal round where they get Pool B runner-up Cuba for a spot in the championship. For Kazakhstan, their journey in the event comes to a close as they fall short of a bid to the 2019 Volleyball Nations League.

Portugal did not garner much of an edge in spikes (32-31) or blocks (8-5), but were clearly the top serving side and notched nine more aces (11-2). One detail that was created from the aggressive serve was that it put Kazakhstan in more uncomfortable possessions as they logged six more team errors. The losing side did see a star performance from Maxim Michsenko (16 points), but Kazakhstan failed to find other options as much as Portugal did with Caique Oswaldo Ferreira Da Silva (11 points), Lourenco Martins (11 points) and Valdir Sequeira (10 points).

Pool B:

• World Rankings: #16 Cuba, #27 Czech Republic, #41 Chile

CUBA DEF. CHILE 3-1

• Cuba def. Chile 3-1 (38-36, 22-25, 31-29, 25-19)
• Cuba improves to 1-1; Chile falls to 0-2

In an absolute battle of a four-set match, Cuba moved past Chile to finish as the runner-up in Pool B and claim a spot in the semifinals. While Chile is eliminated, Cuba will take on the winner of Pool A (Portugal) in the elimination round.

Cuba could not find rhythm at the service line, an advantage for Chile, but they did win the battle of spike (73-57) and block (15-6). The match could have easily shifted though had sets one or three gone the other way, as they almost did going to 30 points. Instead, the culmination of the two led to a let-down for Chile in the fourth. Tomas Parraguire (18 points) did all that he could in the losing effort, but the prowess of Miguel Angel Lopez (25 points) and Osniel Lazaro Melgarejo Hernandez (21 points) were too much in leading Cuba to victory.

STANDINGS:

Pool A

		Matches		Pts	Sets			Points
Rank	Team	W	L		W	L	Ratio	W	L	Ratio
1	Portugal	2	0	6	6	0	MAX	150	113	1.327
2	Estonia	1	1	3	3	4	0.750	149	161	0.925
3	Kazakhstan	0	2	0	1	6	0.167	144	169	0.852

Pool B

		Matches		Pts	Sets			Points
Rank	Team	W	L		W	L	Ratio	W	L	Ratio
1	Czech Republic	2	0	6	6	0	MAX	150	112	1.339
2	Cuba	1	1	3	3	4	0.750	178	184	0.967
3	Chile	0	2	0	1	6	0.167	159	191	0.832

Full Schedule:

Pool A:

Date	Time		Score		Set 1	Set 2	Set 3	Set 4	Set 5	Total	Report
20 Jun	21:00	Portugal	3–0	Estonia	25–19	25–16	25–20			75–55
21 Jun	18:00	Estonia	3–1	Kazakhstan	25–22	19–25	25–19	25–20		94–86
22 Jun	21:00	Kazakhstan	0–3	Portugal	23–25	19–25	16–25			58–75

Pool B:

Date	Time		Score		Set 1	Set 2	Set 3	Set 4	Set 5	Total	Report
20 Jun	18:00	Cuba	0–3	Czech Republic	19–25	22–25	21–25			62–75
21 Jun	21:00	Czech Republic	3–0	Chile	25–15	25–17	25–18			75–50
22 Jun	18:00	Chile	1–3	Cuba	36–38	22–25	31–29	19–25		108–117

Semifinals

Date	Time		Score		Set 1	Set 2	Set 3	Set 4	Set 5	Total	Report
23 Jun	15:00	Czech Republic	–	Estonia	–	–	–			0–0
23 Jun	18:00	Portugal	–	Cuba	–	–	–			0–0

3rd place match

Final