The 2019 FIVB Men's Volleyball Nations League was the second edition of the FIVB Men's Volleyball Nations League, an annual international men's volleyball tournament contested by 16 national teams.[1] The competition was held between May and July 2019, and the final round took place in the Credit Union 1 Arena, Chicago, United States.[2][3] This was the first edition of the World League or the Nations League to have the final round hosted in North America.
Russia successfully defended its title, defeating finals hosts, the United States, in the final. Poland claimed the bronze after sweeping Brazil in three straight sets. Matt Anderson from United States named the MVP of the tournament.
Qualification
Sixteen teams qualified for the competition. Twelve of them qualified as core teams which cannot face relegation. Other four teams were selected as challenger teams which could be relegated from the tournament.[1]Portugal replaced South Korea after winning the 2018 Challenger Cup.[4]
The 16 teams competed in a round-robin format, with every core team hosting a pool at least once. The teams were divided into 4 pools of 4 teams at each week and competed for five weeks, totalling 120 matches. The top five teams after the preliminary round joined the hosts of the final round to compete in the final round.[1] The relegation took into consideration only the 4 challenger teams. The last-ranked challenger team was excluded from the 2020 Volleyball Nations League. The winners of the 2019 Challenger Cup qualified for the next edition as a challenger team.
Final round
The six qualified teams played in 2 pools of 3 teams in a round-robin format. The top 2 teams of each pool qualified for the semifinals. The pool winners played against the runners-up in this round. The semifinals winners advanced to compete for the Volleyball Nations League title. The losers faced each other in the third place match.
Pools composition
The overview of pools was released on October 23, 2018.[1]
To determine the pools standings, the following criteria is applied:[6]
Total number of victories (matches won, matches lost)
In the event of a tie, the following first tiebreaker applied: The teams were ranked by the most points 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
Where teams were still tied after an examination of the number of their victories and points gained, then the FIVB examined the results to break the tie in the following order:
Sets quotient: if two or more teams were tied on the number of points gained, they were ranked by the quotient resulting from the division of the number of all sets won by the number of all sets lost.
Points quotient: where the tie persisted based on the sets quotient, the teams were ranked by the quotient resulting from the division of all points scored by the total of points lost during all sets.
Where the tie persisted based on the points quotient, the tie was broken based on the team that won the match of the Round Robin Phase between the tied teams. Where the tie in points quotient was between three or more teams, these teams were ranked taking into consideration only the matches the teams in question were involved in.
The 16 national teams involved in the tournament were required to register a squad of 25 players, which every week's 14-player roster must be selected from. Each country must declare its 14-player roster two days before the start of each week's round-robin competition.
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