The 2018 FIVB Women's World Championship was the eighteenth edition of the event, contested by the senior women's national teams of the members of the ' (FIVB), the sport's global governing body. The final tournament was held in Japan from 29 September to 20 October 2018. The final four was held at the

Yokohama Arena is an indoor arena located in Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. The capacity of the arena is 17,000 and was opened in 1989. The arena was modeled after US sports venue Madison Square Garden in New York City. It is a five-minute walk from the ...

Yokohama is the List of cities in Japan, second-largest city in Japan by population as well as by area, and the country's most populous Municipalities of Japan, municipality. It is the capital and most populous city in Kanagawa Prefecture, with a popu ...

Serbia , image_flag = Flag of Serbia.svg , national_motto = , image_coat = Coat of arms of Serbia.svg , national_anthem = () , image_map = , map_caption = Location of Serbia (gree ...

won their first world title, defeating

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

in five sets at the final. This was the first all-European final in the Women's World Championship history and the first final since

1990 Important events of 1990 include the Reunification of Germany and the unification of Yemen, the formal beginning of the Human Genome Project (finished in 2003), the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope, the separation of Namibia from South ...

that not featured a team from the Americas. Reigning olympic champions

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

won the third place match, defeating

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

in straight sets. For the first time since the 1974 Championship in Mexico, no team from the Americas reached the final four.

Tijana Bošković Tijana Bošković ( sr-Cyrl, Тијана Бошковић; born 8 March 1997) is a Serbian professional volleyball player of VakıfBank S.K., VakıfBank. A left-handed Opposite hitter, opposite, she has won gold medals with the Serbia women's n ...

from Serbia was elected the MVP.

Host selection

On 25 August 2014, FIVB announced that the tournament would be held in Japan for the third time in twelve years and the fifth time overall. The tournament will take place in six cities:

Hamamatsu is a Cities of Japan, city located in western Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. In September 2023, the city had an estimated population of 780,128 in 340,591 households, making it the prefecture's largest city, with a population density of over the t ...

Kobe Kobe ( ; , ), officially , is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. With a population of around 1.5 million, Kobe is Japan's List of Japanese cities by population, seventh-largest city and the third-largest port city after Port of Toky ...

Nagoya is the largest city in the Chūbu region of Japan. It is the list of cities in Japan, fourth-most populous city in Japan, with a population of 2.3million in 2020, and the principal city of the Chūkyō metropolitan area, which is the List of ...

Osaka is a Cities designated by government ordinance of Japan, designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the List of cities in Japan, third-most populous city in J ...

Sapporo is a Cities designated by government ordinance of Japan, designated city in Hokkaido, Japan. Located in the southwest of Hokkaido, it lies within the alluvial fan of the Toyohira River, a tributary of the Ishikari River. Sapporo is the capital ...

, and

. Japan hosted the Women's World Championship on four previous occasions:

1967 Events January * January 1 – Canada begins a year-long celebration of the 100th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, Confederation, featuring the Expo 67 World's Fair. * January 6 – Vietnam War: United States Marine Corps and Army of ...

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for Lunar water, frozen water, in soil i ...

2006 2006 was designated as the International Year of Deserts and Desertification. Events January * January 1– 4 – Russia temporarily cuts shipment of natural gas to Ukraine during a price dispute. * January 12 – A stampede during t ...

, and

2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...

. Moreover, Japan also hosted the Men's World Championship in

and

. The country has also played hosts to other important volleyball competitions, including the

Asian Women's Volleyball Championship The Asian Women's Volleyball Championship is an international volleyball competition in Asia and Oceania contested by the senior women's national teams of the members of Asian Volleyball Confederation (AVC), the sport's continent governing body ...

and the World Grand Prix final round.

Qualification

The qualification process was a series of tournaments organised by the five FIVB confederations to decide 22 of the 24 teams which would play in the final tournament, with

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

qualifying automatically as hosts and

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

also qualifying automatically as the defending champions. All remaining FIVB member associations were eligible to enter the qualifying process. At first, 160 associations registered teams to compete in the qualification process, but 46 associations withdrew from the qualifying process after they registered and

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

were suspended and then expelled from taking part in the process as a punishment for internal problems in the India Volleyball Federation. The five regional governing bodies were allocated the remaining 22 spots; CAVB (Africa) was granted two, AVC (Asia and Oceania) four, NORCECA (North America) six, CSV (South America) two, and CEV (Europe) eight spots. Of the 24 nations qualified to play at the 2018 World Championship, 21 countries competed at the previous tournament in

2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...

Trinidad and Tobago Trinidad and Tobago, officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean, comprising the main islands of Trinidad and Tobago, along with several List of islands of Trinidad and Tobago, smaller i ...

qualified for the first time. Other teams returning after absences of the last tournament(s) include

Kenya Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya is the 27th-most-populous country in the world and the 7th most populous in Africa. ...

and

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...

, who both missed the 2014 edition.

Squads

Venues

Format

;First round In the first round, the 24 teams are spread across four pools of six teams playing in a round-robin system. The top four teams from each pool advance to the second round. ;Second round In the second round, the 16 teams are allocated in two pools of eight teams (top teams from first round pools A and D in one and top teams from pools B and C in the other). Once again a round-robin system is used in each pool, teams coming from the same first round pool (therefore already played each other) only play against opponents from a different first round pool. The second round standings takes into account the points scored by each team in the first and second rounds. The top three teams of each group will access the third round. ;Third round The six teams competing in the third round are divided into two three-team pools by a draw, with the first place teams from the previous round securing the head position of both pools. After the matches played once again in a round-robin system, the top two in each pool qualify for the semifinals and finals while the third placed teams from each pool play a fifth place match. ;Final round The third round pool winners play against the runners-up in this round. The semifinals winners advance to compete for the World Championship title. The losers face each other in the third place match.

Pools composition

First round

Teams were seeded in the first two positions of each pool following the

Serpentine system The serpentine system, also known as snake seeding, is a method of organization used in competitions to define the seeded teams and arrange them into pools. The ''n'' ranked teams that will be involved in the tournament are distributed in ''m'' ...

according to their

FIVB World Ranking The FIVB Senior World Rankings is a ranking system for men's and women's national teams in volleyball. The teams of the member nations of Fédération Internationale de Volleyball (FIVB), volleyball's world governing body, are ranked based on their ...

as of 7 August 2017. FIVB reserved the right to seed the hosts as heads of pool A regardless of the World Ranking. All teams not seeded were drawn to take other available positions in the remaining lines following the World Ranking. Each pool had no more than three teams from the same confederation. The draw was held in

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

, Japan on 7 December 2017. Rankings as of 7 August 2017 are shown in brackets, except the hosts Japan who ranked sixth. ;Draw

Second round

Third round

Third round draw took place at

Nippon Gaishi Hall , formerly Nagoya Rainbow Hall, is an indoor sports arena located in Nagoya, Aichi, Japan. From April 1, 2007, its name was changed to Nippon Gaishi Hall, to reflect the sponsorship of the NGK Insulators. The capacity of the arena is 10,000 peop ...

on 11 October 2018.

Pool standing procedure

# Total number of victories (matches won, matches lost) # In the event of a tie, the following first tiebreaker will apply: The teams will be ranked by the most point gained per match as follows: #* Match won 3–0 or 3–1: 3 points for the winner, 0 points for the loser #* Match won 3–2: 2 points for the winner, 1 point for the loser #* Match forfeited: 3 points for the winner, 0 points (0–25, 0–25, 0–25) for the loser # If teams are still tied after examining the number of victories and points gained, then the FIVB will examine the results in order to break the tie in the following order: #* Set quotient: if two or more teams are tied on the number of points gained, they will be ranked by the quotient resulting from the division of the number of all set won by the number of all sets lost. #* Points quotient: if the tie persists based on the set quotient, the teams will be ranked by the quotient resulting from the division of all points scored by the total of points lost during all sets. #* If the tie persists based on the point quotient, the tie will be broken based on the team that won the match of the Round Robin Phase between the tied teams. When the tie in point quotient is between three or more teams, these teams ranked taking into consideration only the matches involving the teams in question.

Results

All times are

Japan Standard Time , or , is the standard time zone in Japan, 9 hours ahead of UTC (UTC+09:00). Japan does not observe daylight saving time, though its introduction has been debated on several occasions. During World War II, the time zone was often referred to a ...

( UTC+09:00).

First round

Pool A

Pool B

Pool C

Pool D

Second round

Pool E

Pool F

Third round

Pool G

Pool H

Final round

Semifinals

5th place match

3rd place match

Final

Final standing

''Source
WCH Final standings
'

Awards

* Most valuable player *:

* Best setter *: Ofelia Malinov * Best outside spikers *: Miriam Sylla *: Zhu Ting * Best middle blockers *: Yan Ni *:

Milena Rašić Milena Rašić ( sr-cyr, Милена Рашић; born 25 October 1990) is a Serbian former professional volleyball player. She played for the Serbia women's national volleyball team. She won a silver medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics and also co ...

* Best opposite spiker *:

Paola Egonu Paola Ogechi Egonu (; born 18 December 1998) is an Italian professional volleyball player. She plays for Italian volleyball club Vero Volley Milano and is part of the Italy women's national volleyball team. Early life Egonu was born in Cittad ...

* Best libero *: Monica De Gennaro

Statistics leaders

The statistics of each group follows the vis reports P2 and P3. The statistics include 6 volleyball skills; serve, reception, set, spike, block, and dig. The table below shows the top 5 ranked players in each skill plus top scorers at the completion of the tournament. Only players whose teams advanced to the third round are taken in consideration.

Marketing

Local performance

According to Japan leading news paper 朝日新聞, the two Japanese local business partner were reported to lost money on hosting the competition. TBS is expected to lose nearly 1 billion yen due to bad sales at commercial advertisements. And JVA was expected to lose 600 million yen as the drop of ticket selling.

Broadcasting

FIVB, through several companies, sold the

broadcasting rights Broadcasting rights (often also called media rights) are rights which a broadcasting organization negotiates with a commercial concern - such as a sports governing body or film distributor - in order to show that company's products on television o ...

for the 2018 World Championship to the following broadcasters.

References

External links

Fédération Internationale de Volleyball
– official website
2018 Women's World Championship
– official website
Competition Formula
{{DEFAULTSORT:Volleyball, World Championship, Women, 2018

2018 Events January * January 1 – Bulgaria takes over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, after the Estonian presidency. * January 4 – SPLM-IO rebels loyal to Chan Garang Lual start a raid against Juba, capital of ...

FIVB World Championship Volleyball, World Championship World Championship, Women, 2018 September 2018 sports events in Japan October 2018 sports events in Japan World Championship, 2018 Hamamatsu Sport in Kobe Sports competitions in Nagoya Sport in Osaka Sport in Sapporo Sport in Yokohama Sport in Shizuoka Prefecture

Host selection

Qualification

Squads

Venues

Format

Pools composition

First round

Second round

Third round

Pool standing procedure

Results

First round

Pool A

Pool B

Pool C

Pool D

Second round

Pool E

Pool F

Third round

Pool G

Pool H

Final round

Semifinals

5th place match

3rd place match

Final

Final standing

Awards

Statistics leaders

Marketing

Sponsors

Local performance

Broadcasting

See also

References

External links