Grand Prix Day 3, Group 1 Highlights and Full Match Replay Videos

2017 FIVB VOLLEYBALL WORLD GRAND PRIX – GROUP 1 DAILY RECAP

Group 1
July 7th – August 6th
FIVB World Grand Prix Round 1
Schedule/Results

Serbia and the United States have risen to the top of the standings at the 2017 FIVB World Grand Prix Group 1.

Serbia has gotten there with a perfect 9-0 set run through the first weekend of action in Ankara. On average, they’ve given up just over 18 points per set, with no single opponent scoring more than 20.

Two of those matches were expected to be comfortable for the Serbians. Belgium and Turkey have a combined 1 Olympic appearance and just 5 World Championship appearance in their histories. The other was a dominant 3-0 performance against Brazil, albeit not a full-strength Brazilian squad, on Saturday.

The Americans’ journey has been more impressive in terms of opponent quality, though they’ve given up a few sets. They beat Russia 3-2 to open, swept Italy, and most impressively swept the defending Olympic champions from China 3-0. That’s been done with a squad that has only 2 of their Olympians on it, and is closer to a college all-star team than what American fans would recognize as the National Team.

That China win, though, must be taken with a grain of salt – as the Olympic MVP Zhu Ting didn’t play at all. She’s come in late to each of China’s first two matches and been dominant, lifting them to wins in both. There was no late heroics from Zhu on Sunday, though. Keep in mind that as the hosts of the Final 6, China doesn’t need to win anything – they get a free pass through to the last round.

The biggest surprise on Sunday was the Dutch, 4th at last year’s Olympics, being upset by Japan. In normal circumstances, that should be a very close and competitive match (and it was, Japan won 3-2), but Japan hasn’t played well this week, and the ‘transitive property of sports’ indicated a Dutch win was coming. The Dutch swept the Dominican earlier in the week, and the Dominican beat Japan 3-1 on Saturday; the Dutch also swept Thailand, while Thailand push Japan to 5 sets.

But after Sarina Koga played just 1 set in the Japan loss to the Dominican, she returned to action on Sunday with 22 points, and that made the difference for Japan.

Remember that, besides interim prizes awarded for pool wins and match results, the big prizes come to those who advance to the Final 6. All teams’ records, regardless of pool, are put into one big table that determines who will advance.

Group 1 Table After Day 3

		Matches		Pts	Sets			Points
Rank	Team	W	L	Pts	W	L	Ratio	W	L	Ratio
1	Serbia	3	0	9	9	0	MAX	225	163	1.380
2	United States	3	0	8	9	2	4.500	262	225	1.164
3	Netherlands	2	1	7	8	3	2.667	250	224	1.116
4	Dominican Republic	2	1	6	6	5	1.200	261	254	1.028
5	Brazil	2	1	5	6	5	1.200	244	237	1.030
6	China	2	1	5	6	6	1.000	268	274	0.978
7	Japan	2	1	4	7	7	1.000	300	294	1.020
8	Turkey	1	2	4	5	7	0.714	248	267	0.929
9	Italy	1	2	2	4	8	0.500	267	280	0.954
10	Russia	0	3	3	6	9	0.667	319	337	0.947
11	Thailand	0	3	1	3	9	0.333	239	278	0.860
12	Belgium	0	3	0	1	9	0.111	198	248	0.798

Ranking system:

Number of matches won
Match points
Sets ratio
Points ratio
If the tie continues as per the point ratio between two teams, the priority will be given to the team which won the last match between them. When the tie in points ratio is between three or more teams, a new classification of these teams in the terms of points 1, 2 and 3 will be made taking into consideration only the matches in which they were opposed to each other.

Match won 3–0 or 3–1: 3 match points for the winner, 0 match points for the loser
Match won 3–2: 2 match points for the winner, 1 match point for the loser

DAY 1, 2 & 3 RESULTS (WITH LINKS TO FULL STATS):

Pool A1

Venue: Başkent Volleyball Hall, Ankara, Turkey
All times are Turkey Time (UTC+03:00).
VolleyMob Day 1 recap
VolleyMob Day 2 recap
VolleyMob Day 3 recap

Date	Time		Score		Set 1	Set 2	Set 3	Set 4	Set 5	Total	Report
7 Jul	16:30	Turkey	0–3	Serbia	19–25	17–25	15–25			51–75	P2 P3
7 Jul	19:30	Belgium	0–3	Brazil	22–25	23–25	18–25			63–75	P2 P3
8 Jul	16:30	Brazil	0–3	Serbia	19–25	20–25	19–25			58–75	P2 P3
8 Jul	19:30	Turkey	3–1	Belgium	23–25	25–20	25–20	25–16		98–81	P2 P3
9 Jul	16:30	Serbia	3–0	Belgium	25–18	25–18	25–18			75–54	P2 P3
9 Jul	19:30	Turkey	2–3	Brazil	26–24	17–25	18–25	25–22	13–15	99–111	P2 P3

Pool B1

Venue: Kunshan Stadium, Kunshan, China
All times are China Standard Time (UTC+08:00).
VolleyMob Day 1 recap
VolleyMob Day 2 recap
VolleyMob Day 3 recap

Date	Time		Score		Set 1	Set 2	Set 3	Set 4	Set 5	Total	Report
7 Jul	15:00	United States	3–2	Russia	22–25	25–19	25–27	25–16	15–11	112–98	P2 P3
7 Jul	19:00	China	3–1	Italy	25–20	20–25	25–23	25–20		95–88	P2 P3
8 Jul	15:00	Italy	0–3	United States	21–25	22–25	19–25			62–75	P2 P3
8 Jul	19:00	China	3–2	Russia	24–26	25–21	16–25	27–25	16–14	108–111	P2 P3
9 Jul	15:00	Russia	2–3	Italy	21–25	29–27	26–24	24–26	10–15	110–117	P2 P3
9 Jul	19:00	China	0–3	United States	22–25	22–25	21–25			65–75	P2 P3

Pool C1

Venue: Omnisport Apeldoorn, Apeldoorn, Netherlands
All times are Central European Summer Time (UTC+02:00).
VolleyMob Day 1 recap
VolleyMob Day 2 recap
VolleyMob Day 3 recap

Date	Time		Score		Set 1	Set 2	Set 3	Set 4	Set 5	Total	Report
7 Jul	17:30	Netherlands	3–0	Dominican Republic	25–21	25–19	25–21			75–61	P2 P3
7 Jul	20:30	Japan	3–2	Thailand	25–19	18–25	25–14	22–25	15–9	105–92	P2 P3
8 Jul	17:30	Netherlands	3–0	Thailand	25–20	26–24	25–16			76–60	P2 P3
8 Jul	20:30	Dominican Republic	3–1	Japan	25–20	25–19	24–26	29–27		103–92	P2 P3
9 Jul	17:30	Netherlands	2–3	Japan	25–17	25–21	18–25	22–25	9–15	99–103	P2 P3
9 Jul	20:30	Thailand	1–3	Dominican Republic	22–25	25–22	22–25	18–25		87–97	P2 P3