Title Favorites, Russia Releases WCH Roster

2018 FIVB Volleyball Men’s World Championship

• 9–30 September
• Schedule
• Teams
• Power Rankings

The Russian volleyball federation has announced in its official website the team’s official WCH roster. Here is who the team is taking to Italy and Bulgaria:

• Setters: Alexander Butko (Zenit Kazan), Sergey Grankin (Dinamo Mosca)
• Opposites: Maxim Mikhaylov (Zenit Kazan), Viktor Poletaev (Kuzbass Kemerovo)
• Middle Blockers: Ilya Vlasov (Torch), Artem Volvich (Zenit-Kazan), Ilyas Kurkayev (Lokomotiv Ns), Dmitry Musersky (1988, Belogorie)
• Outside Hitters: Dmitry Volkov (Fakel Novy Urengoy), Egor Kliuka (Fakel Novy Urengoy), Yury Berezhko (Dinamo Mosca), Alexey Rodichev (Lokomotiv Ns)
• Liberos: Alexey Verbov (Zenit Kazan), Alexander Sokolov (Yaroslavich Yaroslavl)

Fans will notice that the biggest change from this roster to the one Russia deployed to the VNL is the absence of setter Igor Kobzar, who led the team to the title, which just goes to show how deep this team really is. Also missing from the VNL roster are the middle blocker Igor Phillipov, opposite Romanas Shkulyavichu, libero Aleksei Kabeshov (injury), and outside hitter Anton Karpukhov (injured).

Russia, the leading team in VolleyMob’s WCH Power Rankings, is the most decorated team in WCH history with 6 titles, but with no successes since 1982. It will debut in the WCH on September 12 against Australia. It will then go on to play against Tunisia, USA, Cameroon, and Serbia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsDaWhy8h1M