FIVB Volleyball World League

The FIVB Volleyball World League was an annual international men's volleyball competition. Created in 1990, it was the longest and richest of all the international events organized by the Fédération Internationale de Volleyball (FIVB). The women's version of the competition was called FIVB Volleyball World Grand Prix. This event should not be confused with the other international volleyball competitions, the World Championship, the World Cup and the World Grand Champions Cup.

From 2018, the World League and World Grand Prix was replaced by the men's and women's Nations League and men's and women's Challenger Cup.<ref>FIVB drastically changes format for 2018 World League and Grand Prix – World of Volley, 19 June 2017</ref><ref>FIVB announces the Volleyball Nations League</ref>

History

Origins

File:WorldLeagueLogo.png

First FIVB World League logo

File:VolleyballWL newlogo.PNG

Second FIVB World League logo

The World League was created in 1990 as part of the intensive marketing programme that would become a distinctive mark of the FIVB's activities near the end of the century. The idea was to promote the sport of volleyball by establishing an annual competition that would appeal to audiences all over the world.Template:Citation needed

Winners

In the 1990s, the Italians dominated the World League, winning the first three tournaments in 1990, 1991 and 1992. Playing at home, Brazil, at the time the Olympic champions, managed to take the gold in 1993, but Italy regained the title in 1994 and 1995.

In 1996, foreshadowing what would happen just a couple of months later at the Atlanta Olympic Games, the Netherlands beat them in an extremely tight five-set match, before Italy once again won the gold in 1997. In 1998, the winners were Cuba, while in 1999 and 2000 Italy won again.

As can be seen, Italy were clearly the dominant team in the first decade of the World League: from 1990 to 2000, the World League was played 11 times, and Italy took gold eight times, while the remaining three titles were won by three different teams.

Italy's supremacy in the World League began to wane in 2001, when Brazil won a second gold medal, beating the Italians in three straight sets. With further titles each year from 2003 to 2007, and winning another titles in 2009 and 2010, the Brazilians were the preeminent at the start of the 21st century, being also World and Olympic Champions. The interruptions to Brazil's dominance came in 2002, when Russia took the title, and in 2008, with the United States winning gold and gaining positive momentum going into the Beijing Olympics.

Competition formula

The FIVB is constantly adapting the World League's competition formula to improve competitiveness and to make the games more attractive to the audience. Nevertheless, a few basic rules and restrictions will probably remain unchanged in the following years.

• Teams who participate must provide local media coverage and live TV broadcasting.
• The competition is divided in at least two phases: a preliminary round (usually called "Intercontinental Round"), with a system of rotating host cities; and one or more final rounds, with one or more host nations.
• In the preliminary round, teams are organized in pools. Each team plays a total of four matches against all other teams in its pool, two at home, two as visitors. Each pair of matches is played over a weekend.
• When all the matches of the preliminary round have been played, the top n teams in each pool qualify for the final round(s), and the remaining ones leave the competition. The value of n depends on the number of participating teams and the format that will be employed in the finals.
• Host nation(s) automatically qualify for the final round(s).
• The FIVB has tried various formats for the final round(s): Top Six, Top Four, Quarter-Semi-finals (Olympic format). For some years now (2004), the most commonly used is a mixed format: quarterfinalists are organized in two pools, and the top two teams in each pool play semifinals and finals according to the Olympic format.
• In the preliminary round, a team is usually given the right to work with a list of nineteen players, from which the coach builds the fourteen-player line-up included two liberos (if the team include only one libero in the roster, their max roster number is limited to 12) that will be employed in a particular weekend. For the final round(s), only fourteen players included two liberos are allowed.

Hosts

List of hosts by number of final round championships hosted.

Times hosted	Hosts	Year(s)
6	Template:ITA	1991, 1992, 1994, 1998, 2004, 2014
6	Template:BRA	1993, 1995, 2002, 2008, 2015, 2017
4	Template:POL	2001, 2007, 2011, 2016
3	Template:ARG	1999, 2010, 2013
2	Template:NED	1996, 2000
2	Template:RUS	1997, 2006
2	Template:SRB	2005, 2009
1	Template:JPN	1990
1	Template:ESP	2003
1	Template:BUL	2012

Appearance

Brazil and Italy are the only teams that participated in all editions of the World League.

Team	Intercontinental Round			Final RoundTemplate:Efn-ua
	Template:Tooltip	First	Last	Template:Tooltip	First	Last
Template:Vb	28	1990	2017	25	1990	2017
Template:Vb	28	1990	2017	22	1990	2016
Template:VbTemplate:Efn-ua	26	1990	2017	22	1990	2017
Template:Vb	26	1991	2016	15	1991	2012
Template:Vb	24	1990	2017	1	2008	2008
Template:Vb	22	1990	2017	7	2001	2017
Template:Vb	21	1990	2017	10	1990	2002
Template:VbTemplate:Efn-ua	20	1997	2017	13	2000	2017
Template:Vb	20	1990	2017	11	1992	2017
Template:Vb	20	1994	2017	10	1994	2013
Template:Vb	20	1998	2017	9	2001	2016
Template:Vb	19	1996	2017	5	1999	2013
Template:Vb	19	1991	2017	1	1995	1995
Template:Vb	18	1990	2017	1	1996	1996
Template:Vb	15	1995	2017	3	1999	2003
Template:Vb	14	1999	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	13	1993	2017	1	2003	2003
Template:Vb	13	1992	2017	1	2012	2012
Template:Vb	13	1993	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	11	1991	2017	2	2013	2017
Template:Vb	9	2001	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	7	2006	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	5	2003	2017	1	2003	2003
Template:Vb	5	1999	2017	1	2014	2014
Template:Vb	5	2013	2017	1	2014	2014
Template:Vb	4	2011	2016	–	–	–
Template:Vb	4	2014	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	4	2014	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	4	2014	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	4	2014	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	4	2014	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	3	2015	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	3	2015	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	2	2016	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	2	2016	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	2	2016	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	1	2017	2017	–	–	–
Template:Vb	1	2017	2017	–	–	–

Results summary

{{#invoke:Labelled list hatnote|labelledList|Main article|Main articles|Main page|Main pages}}

Year	Final host		Final				3rd place match				Teams Template:Tooltip / Template:Tooltip
			Champions	Score	Runners-up		3rd place	Score	4th place
1990	Template:Flagicon Osaka		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		8 / 4
1991	Template:Flagicon Milan		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		10 / 4
1992	Template:Flagicon Genoa		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		12 / 4
1993	Template:Flagicon São Paulo		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		12 / 4
1994	Template:Flagicon Milan		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		12 / 6
1995	Template:Flagicon Rio de Janeiro		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		12 / 6
1996	Template:Flagicon Rotterdam		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		11 / 6
1997	Template:Flagicon Moscow		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		12 / 6
1998	Template:Flagicon Milan		Template:Vb-big	Round-robin	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	Round-robin	Template:Vb-big		12 / 4
1999	Template:Flagicon Mar del Plata		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		12 / 6
2000	Template:Flagicon Rotterdam		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		12 / 6
2001	Template:Flagicon Katowice		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		16 / 8
2002	Template:Flagicon Template:Nowrap		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		16 / 8
2003	Template:Flagicon Madrid		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		16 / 8
2004	Template:Flagicon Rome		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		12 / 4
2005	Template:Flagicon Belgrade		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		12 / 4
2006	Template:Flagicon Moscow		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		16 / 6
2007	Template:Flagicon Katowice		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		16 / 6
2008	Template:Flagicon Rio de Janeiro		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		16 / 6
2009	Template:Flagicon Belgrade		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		16 / 6
2010	Template:Flagicon Córdoba		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		16 / 6
2011	Template:Flagicon Gdańsk–Sopot		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		16 / 8
2012	Template:Flagicon Sofia		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		16 / 6
2013	Template:Flagicon Mar del Plata		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		18 / 6
2014	Template:Flagicon Florence		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		28 / 6
2015	Template:Flagicon Rio de Janeiro		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		32 / 6
2016	Template:Flagicon Kraków		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–0	Template:Vb-big		36 / 6
2017	Template:Flagicon Curitiba		Template:Vb-big	3–2	Template:Vb-big		Template:Vb-big	3–1	Template:Vb-big		36 / 6

Most valuable player by edition

• 1990 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1991 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1992 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1993 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1994 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1995 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1996 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1997 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1998 – Template:Flagathlete
• 1999 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2000 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2001 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2002 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2003 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2004 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2005 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2006 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2007 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2008 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2009 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2010 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2011 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2012 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2013 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2014 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2015 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2016 – Template:Flagathlete
• 2017 – Template:Flagathlete

Gallery

• FIVB World League Final Match Brazil vs Serbia and Montenegro, July 10, 2005
  FIVB World League Final Match Brazil vs Serbia and Montenegro, July 10, 2005
• Cup Ceremony FIVB World League 2011 (Russia Champions)
  Cup Ceremony FIVB World League 2011 (Russia Champions)
• Poland fans at FIVB World League 2013
  Poland fans at FIVB World League 2013
• Spike by Giba
  Spike by Giba
• Brazil Champion FIVB World League 2009
  Brazil Champion FIVB World League 2009
• Dive by Bartosz Kurek
  Dive by Bartosz Kurek
• Iran and United States teams in FIVB World League 2015
  Iran and United States teams in FIVB World League 2015
• Poland at FIVB World League Final 2011
  Poland at FIVB World League Final 2011
• Italian Player in FIVB World League 2012
  Italian Player in FIVB World League 2012
• Spike style by Bulgarian Player
  Spike style by Bulgarian Player

See also

• Volleyball at the Summer Olympics
• FIVB Volleyball Men's Nations League
• FIVB Volleyball Men's World Championship
• FIVB Volleyball Men's World Cup
• FIVB Volleyball Men's Challenger Cup
• FIVB Volleyball World Grand Champions Cup
• FIVB Volleyball World Grand Prix
• FIVB Volleyball Women's Nations League
• FIVB Volleyball Women's World Championship
• FIVB Volleyball Women's World Cup
• FIVB Volleyball Women's Challenger Cup
• List of indoor volleyball world medalists

External links

• Fédération Internationale de Volleyball – official website
• FIVB Volleyball World League – official website
• Results ArchiveTemplate:Dead link – comprehensive results for all tournaments