High Expectations for Volleyball at Next Year’s Olympics

The Covid-19 pandemic may have put pay to much of this year’s volleyball action. But there is hope due to the fact that it looks like the next Olympic Games is scheduled to feature the best in volleyball entertainment. The original 2020 Olympics was due to be held in Tokyo this summer.

Putting on such a massive sporting event was clearly not going to work with the public health crisis. But at the moment, it looks like the 2020 Olympic Games will be rescheduled to take place between 23 July and 8 August in 2021. It will keep the original Tokyo 2020 name for marketing and promotional purposes.

Volleyball has featured at every single Olympic Games since 1964. It will be one of the 33 sports featured at the Tokyo Olympics. The volleyball matches are scheduled to begin on Saturday 24 July and they will run through to the final on 6 August. Obviously such scheduling is more than liable to change in regards to the ongoing pandemic. We have already seen how the volleyball Olympic qualifying events that were meant to take place in spring 2020 had to be cancelled due to the health crisis.

But hopes are high that the volleyball matches should get to take place at the purpose-built 12,000 seater Ariake Arena in Tokyo. Many of the bookmakers featured at this link are already starting to accept bets on which national volleyball teams are likely to pick up the gold medal. While there is still over half a year before the Olympics kick off, there’s already plenty of debate about who will win the men’s competition.

All eyes will certainly be on the Brazilian team. Brazil emerged as the clear 3-0 winners over Italy in the final, and expectations are that Renan Dal Zotto’s side can once again claim gold in Japan. However, the Italian team will be keen to make up for that upset. Plus both the United States and Russia looked good at the last Olympics and we could be set for a thrilling competition.

It was a deeply emotional victory for Brazil. This is because the team had managed to make up for defeats in their last two Olympic men’s volleyball finals. The raucous atmosphere in Rio made the perfect setting for the long overdue triumph on home soil. The victory was given the seal of approval by the appearance of Brazil’s current footballing star Neymar. It all went a long way to make amends for the disappointments of 2012 when Brazil lost to Russia after somehow missing two seemingly straightforward match points.

However, things could be very different in the women’s competition. While Brazil had been dominant at the 2012 and 2016 Olympics, it was China who managed to stage a remarkable upset at the 2020 Olympics in Rio. The Chinese team managed to hold their nerve to beat Serbia 3-1 in the final. Brazil fell far short this time around, and even found themselves behind the United States and the Netherlands.

It was a remarkable win for China. This is because head coach Lang Ping became the first person to win Olympic volleyball gold both as a coach and player. She proved to have the experience necessary to guide her team to glory after they went a set down against the Serbian team. The Olympic gold followed on from the team winning the World Cup in Japan the year previously. But inconsistent results including a losing Olympic opener against the Netherlands meant that many doubted whether China could go the distance.

All of which will set up the Tokyo Olympics to be a thrilling spectacle of volleyball entertainment. The action will take place over several rounds. The preliminary rounds will make way for the straight knockout tournament that progresses from the round of 16 through the quarter finals, the semi-finals and the final itself. But with plenty of uncertainty about what could happen in the run-up to the delayed Olympics, it’s anybody’s guess what could happen when matchday finally comes around.

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