Australia, Japan Score Day 9 Upsets, VNL Top 4 Teams Remain the Same

2018 FIVB Men’s Volleyball Nations League – Week 3

May 25-July 8, 2018
Schedule/Results

After three weeks, none of the 16 teams have been mathematically eliminated although the picture looks awfully grim for 0-9 South Korea, which has just one point to its credit.

Week 3 was one of many upsets with Germany delivering two of those giant killer blows, before succumbing to a hungry Australia team on Sunday. Forty errors plagued the Germans, who opted to play without Tobias Krick and use Simon Hirsch in limited capacity.

In another surprise result, Japan edged past Italy in five sets with help from 43 Italian miscues.

Blocks were key in France as both Argentina and the host French piled up 12 and 14 stuffs respectively in wins over Korea and Serbia.

Brazil extended its win streak to seven matches with a 3-0 showing in Russia, including a sweep of China on Sunday, with help from a 21-point showing by Wallace DeSouza.

Russia’s Dmitriy Muserskiy was the top scorer on the day with 24 points in a four-set win over Iran, while Japan’s Yuji Nishida also notched 24 points as his team edged Italy in five.

Here’s a look at how it all went down on Sunday.

Pool 9 Recap: Australia Recap; USA Recap
Pool 10 Recap
Pool 11 Recap
Pool 12 Recap

At the end of the day, the top four teams remained the same from day eight to day nine with Poland and Brazil tied at the top followed by France and the United States. Russia and Serbia swapped spots as the Serbs fell victim to France in a sweep and Russia edged past Iran.

Standings

		Matches		Pts	Sets			Points
Rank	Team	W	L	Pts	W	L	Ratio	W	L	Ratio
1	Poland	8	1	23	25	7	3.571	775	665	1.165
2	Brazil	8	1	23	26	8	3.250	800	724	1.105
3	France	7	2	22	23	9	2.556	776	671	1.156
4	United States	7	2	20	23	13	1.769	818	746	1.097
5	Russia	6	3	19	21	11	1.909	763	712	1.072
6	Serbia	6	3	15	18	17	1.059	776	764	1.016
7	Italy	5	4	16	20	16	1.250	813	789	1.030
8	Canada	5	4	15	18	15	1.200	755	753	1.003
9	Germany	4	5	13	16	18	0.889	758	762	0.995
10	Japan	4	5	11	15	21	0.714	784	813	0.964
11	Iran	3	6	9	15	20	0.750	791	812	0.974
12	Bulgaria	3	6	9	14	21	0.667	753	800	0.941
13	Argentina	2	7	8	14	21	0.667	772	823	0.938
14	Australia	2	7	6	11	23	0.478	715	804	0.889
15	China	2	7	6	9	23	0.391	667	751	0.888
16	South Korea	0	9	1	2	27	0.074	588	715	0.822