Summer Olympic Sports: Volleyball

Indoor volleyball has been part of the Olympic Games since 1964. (Beach volleyball was added in 1992; we’ll take about that in a later post.) Twelve teams participate in each of the men’s and women’s events. The host team automatically qualifies. In addition, three teams qualify via the World Cup and eight teams qualify in two qualification tournaments.

Eight of Twelve teams have been chosen so far for Beijing. They are:

Women’s: Algeria, Brazil, China, Cuba, USA, Russia, Italy, and Venezuela
Men’s: Brazil, Bulgaria, China, Egypt, Russia, Serbia, USA, Venezuela

The competition is divided into two distinct phases. For the initial phase, the field is divided into two pools of six teams and each team plays each team in the pool. The top four teams in each pool advance.

For the second phase, or final round, the teams compete in a single elimination tournament with quarter-finals, semi-finals, and finals. For the finals, the top two teams play for the Gold Medal and the third and fourth teams play for the Bronze.e

For the 2008 Olympics, the Indooor Volleyball events will be played at the Capital Indoor Stadium in Beijing’s Haidian District. The stadium seats 18,000 spectators.

^{(photo © Newscom)}