Italy’s men shut-out Serbia to book Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games berth

Sunday night’s 3-0 victory (25-16, 25-19, 25-19) was wrapped up in only 90 minutes by the hosts as the qualifiers held across the globe were brought to a close.

Italy join Brazil, Russia, USA, Poland and Argentina, who had qualified earlier on Sunday, plus Japan who had a spot by default as hosts in the 12-team line-up of Tokyo 2020.

Led by Ivan Zaytsev’s scoring (13 points including all three of his team’s aces), Italy outblocked the Serbia side six to one, as the Balkan side conceded as many as 18 unforced errors in the three sets. In fact the ‘Azzurri’ were hardly threatened by Serbia, who failed to reach into the 20s in any of the three sets.

In Varna, Brazil survived one Bulgarian match point before pulling off an incredible comeback from two sets down to beat the home side 3-2 (23-25, 19-25, 32-30, 25-16, 15-11).

After Bulgaria stormed to a two-set lead, Brazil fought off one match point that would have seen the Bulgarians through to Tokyo in straight sets, instead of the reigning three-time Olympic champions.

As it was, the South Americans fought back from that potential shock and cruised in the fourth set, gaining an early lead and expanding on that as the set wore on. From there Bulgaria never came back into the game. It was a string of errors that cost Bulgaria the match, as they gave away a whopping 36 points. Yoandy Leal with 22 points and Wallace De Souza with 20 (including four aces) brought the points in for Brazil, as they managed to find their way back into the match.

Earlier in Varna, Ahmed Shafik scored 15 points in leading Egypt in their 3-0 win over Puerto Rico (25-17, 31-29, 25-17).

In Saint Petersburg, Russia took just over an hour and half to claim their place after a 3-0 win (25-19, 25-23, 25-23) win over Iran. It was not as easy as the final score might suggest, with Russia having to fight back from 17-20 down in the third set, before tying at 21-21, breaking clear and taking the final point on an attacking error.

Also in Saint Petersburg, Cuba shut out Mexico in the NORCECA derby 3-0 (25-18, 25-23, 25-22), though both teams were already out of contention for a place at the Games before the start of play.
In Rotterdam, three-time Olympic champions USA overpowered the Netherlands 3-1 (25-18, 25-20, 17-25, 25-21) to claim their Olympic spot.
Matt Anderson led the scoring for the Americans on 18 points, as Aaron Russell added another 17, whilst Nimir Abdel-Aziz was the game’s high scorer on 23 for the Netherlands.

In Gdansk, reigning world champions Poland had made it through to Tokyo 2020 after coming from a set down to beat Slovenia 3-1 (21-25, 25-23, 25-23, 25-21).

Slovenia had needed a straight-set sweep and a point difference of 17 or more to complete the upset and get the Olympic ticket themselves, and it looked on as they shocked the pool hosts by taking the first set and reducing the gap to 13 points.

Although the two teams were still neck-and-neck at 20-20 in the second set, Poland made a break to open up a two-point margin and ultimately take the decisive second set to seal their spot, before closing down the match in the third.
France dropped out of contention earlier in the day also in Gdansk when they lost a set to Tunisia, although they did recover to win 3-1 (25-21, 20-25, 25-19, 25-22).

Argentina had become the first team of the weekend to secure a ticket to next year’s Olympic Games, after taking two sets from China to finish top of their qualification pool in Ningbo undefeated with a 3-2 win (19-25, 25-22, 25-21, 18-25, 15-9).

Starting out on Sunday, all Argentina needed was two sets to secure the top position in the pool rankings and they were stunned into action after China – who were also seeking a win for full points to grab the Olympic ticket – ran away with the first set.

The South Americans rallied to take the next two sets and clinch their spot in Tokyo before the Chinese fought back to level at two set each, with Argentina wrapping up the match with in the fifth set.

Previously in Ningbo on Sunday, Stephen Maar and Jason Derocco shared top-scoring honours with 14 points each for Canada as they led the North Americans to a 3-0 (25-16, 26-24, 25-20) over Finland despite both sides being already out of contention for

The five remaining spots to make up the 12-team Tokyo 2020 Olympic line-up will be decided in January at continental qualifiers.

Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games
Men’s volleyball qualifiers

• Japan (hosts)
• Argentina
• Poland
• USA
• Russia
• Brazil
• Italy
• qualifier to be decided from Africa
• qualifier to be decided from Asia
• qualifier to be decided from Europe
• qualifier to be decided from NORCECA
• qualifier to be decided from South America