Olympic volleyball prelim schedule confirmed

(BEIJING, June 11) -- At the press conference room of Capital Gymnasium in Beijing on Wednesday, in front of relevant officials, including FIVB first executive vice-president Wei Jizhong and BOCOG executive vice-president Yang Shu'an, Capital Gymnasium employees, and interested media, lots were drawn to determine the order of matches in the preliminary rounds of the Olympic volleyball tournaments.

A total of 24 teams (12 women's, 12 men's) were divided into two pools, A and B. Based on a serpentine system which referred to world volleyball rankings as of January 5, 2008, the results of the draw were as follows:

Women's Pool A: China, Cuba, USA, Japan, Poland, Venezuela

Women's Pool B: Brazil, Italy, Russia, Serbia, Kazakhstan, Algeria

Men's Pool A: China, USA, Bulgaria, Italy, Japan, Venezuela

Men's Pool B: Brazil, Russia, Poland, Serbia, Egypt, Germany

According to tradition, the top four teams in each pool will advance to the quarter-finals, with A1 vs. B4,A2 vs. B3,B2 vs. A3 and B1 vs. A4. However, in order to avoid the problems with this scheme that arose during the Athens Olympics, the game between A1 and B4 will remain the same, but the other matches will be scheduled according to another drawing.

Wei stated that FIVB will decide on arrangements regarding the quarter-finals on at a conference on the 16th or 17th of the month.