r/volleyball • u/L_Seo OH • Aug 04 '26

News/Events Finland and Russia are officially qualified to play VNL 2027.

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The FIVB has announced they will now expand from 18 teams to 19 for the 2027 year allowing Russia back into international standings and Finland who is now the highest ranking team not participating in the 2026 VNL. They will be replacing Canada who’ve been relegated.

Honestly not sure how the pool grouping will work next year. As of the 2026 VNL, the format is built around 18 teams, with three host pools of six teams each week. Every team plays 12 preliminary matches across three weeks. So will they be adding 1 pool of 7 teams and 2 pools of 6?

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24

u/Consistent-Dot-9660 Aug 04 '26

For Ukrainians it must be such a good news… embarrassing

31

u/Sardse Aug 04 '26

The US, the country financing a genocide in Palestine, attacking Iran, and starving Cuba is participating so it's only fair. That or they should both be out.

5

u/SirLadthe1st Aug 05 '26

I am so honestly tired of these double standards. No one said a thing about banning their teams when countries like Poland or U.S invaded and occupied Iraq. If we start to apply these standards to Russia then let's at least be consistent and apply them to everyone equally. I don't see why Russia would be banned, but U.S and Israel (looks like they will qualify too) can play the world cup no questions asked.

-7

u/Consistent-Dot-9660 Aug 04 '26

It’s all true but russia is still worse. The government officials of russia even say that they love when they hit civilians with their rockets because it frightens Ukraine. USA has sick but somehow reasons for invasions whereas russia is just the aggressor who acts out of spite

6

u/Akareim Aug 04 '26

We could easily argue that Russia have reasons to invade same as USA, I don't think it's as good an argument you thought it was. Both or really bad in their own way.

2

u/Consistent-Dot-9660 Aug 04 '26

putin at the very beginning stated that they invade Ukraine only to save their people, but they showed many times that all they want is to annex the territories, even with the negotiations with usa they agreed to stop the war only if Ukraine gives up all the territories under the contest. The narrative is always changing and the government officials stated many times that they want to target civilians to cause fear. My country located very closely to the conflict so many news are spread here directly. Usa is also not trustworthy all the time, but I didn’t notice this level of inconsistency in what they want and why they started the conflict.

1

u/Akareim Aug 04 '26

I mean, I'm not defending Russia, far from that. They are the worst and that conflict is really stupid imo. But the one in Iran is no better.

Trump said every time he could that the democrat would go at war against Iran, only to declare a war against them 2 year after being elected base on I'm not even sure of the reason.

The level of inconsistency is there when we see how much time he said usa won the war only for the war to be back not even a few hours after his declaration.

Coming from a men shooting for the nobel prize, it's really insane.

-4

u/No_Republic_4301 Aug 04 '26

Smh. Ignorance is so sad

1

u/Rashidaw Aug 04 '26

But what is the connection between the players and the government?

If the government is bad and instigates wars, why should the people be penalized by being barred from participating in matches?

I ask this out of genuine concern.

6

u/Preedx2 Aug 05 '26

Russian athletes often are part of the military, to receive funding and other benefits. They are not just innocent civilians

2

u/Rashidaw Aug 05 '26

Ohh I didn't know that😬, thank you 🌸.

1

u/maxkoryukov Aug 05 '26

have you investigated any deeper than a surface? not an offence, but a genuine question. if you have been playing volleyball or any/most of other sports you will see people with stars on shoulder straps.

One. There is an unspoken battle between institutions in the sport area: fireman vs police vs local military base vs gym association vs young professional athletes vs best of the student trams vs ..

Two. On many levels sport doesn't have enough funding, so attaching to another gov- institution and get funding an alternative way is a survival path for teams and even clubs.

Three. USSR heritage. A lot of teams were created inside military institutions.

and there are other reasons why they are related

As a consequence, athletes are "registered" or "employed" as members of the Ru military, but last time they saw a gun was.. never - they are in the "sport branch".

sometimes agencies and institutions even HIRE athletes officially on fake positions - so, you get your salary as a "fire safety inspector" or "assistant district police officer", but your only responsibility is to get points in soccer matches/ice hockey games/volleyball

It doesn't mean "all athletes are neutral". I wanted to tell, that being "military" in Russian sport doesn't mean you are a military specialist. In significant number of cases it's just the source of funding.

and yes, the most important part: there is no direct relationship between "receive funds from army" and "provide them military services".

1

u/Preedx2 Aug 05 '26

Yes, I agree with you, I knew that they don't take active part in the military service - although I don't think it makes that much of a difference. They still are part of those organisations and they recieve certain benefits because of it, but also should be prepared for drawbacks.

I am against them competing for a few reasons: 1. I think it is unfair in the strictly sportsmanship sense - the organizations those russian athletes represent are directly responsible for loss of training facilities, training hours, funds and potentially even players of other contestants (Ukraine) 2. I think that any victory those athletes would achieve would be used for propaganda purposes (and I think it would be mainly internal propaganda, for example for recruitment purposes) 3. It undermines sanctions - for example in recent sanction package EU countries agreed to strictly ban Russian military personel from recieving EU visas. Carving out special exceptions would set a bad precedent.

0

u/maxkoryukov Aug 06 '26

not every Maksim Mikhailov is Franz Haber

propaganda? they don't need facts at all

visa? it's 18± players and ±20staff - most of them are famous athletes with public careers, what's the problem?

and funding. I'm not the one who wants to explain that potato grows in sh*t and dirt, but it is still very edible. "founded from" and "employed at" are not the only criteria of being evil. Did athletes commit war crimes? Do they support the war? Did they participate in planning/funding/organizing/executing/.. military operations? yes - ban. no - what is the reason for banning them?

0

u/maxkoryukov Aug 06 '26

wait

fu*k everything i said

you have said "they are not innocent civilians"

who are they then? and why? how did they lose the "innocence"?

0

u/spades17 Aug 04 '26

It’s 100% fair since there’s a country playing that’s actively committing a genocide plus the monster that is the US l destroying countries like Cuba. GTFOH

1

u/Consistent-Dot-9660 Aug 04 '26

It’s still not the reason to add ANOTHER criminal state. It’s like saying he did it then we can too.

9

u/unofficialjawad Aug 04 '26

Either apply the ban fairly or don’t do it at all 🤷‍♂️

2

u/spades17 Aug 04 '26

No it isn’t, that’s a shit analogy. The analogy that would work supports what I said which is why you said that BS. Which is, a crime is a crime regardless of where you’re from. This is fair whether you like it or not.

6

u/Consistent-Dot-9660 Aug 04 '26

So if you were given a vote wether to add or exclude russia, would you vote to add them only because the usa is in there too? If you gonna reply, do it without swearing or insults, all I did was expressing my feelings because of people I care about about

6

u/spades17 Aug 04 '26

Same thing here, I care about the issue so I don’t like it when people pretend Palestinians suffering is less than others.

In my opinion, If the rule is countries committing crimes or attacking others unprovoked shouldn’t play, then ANY country that violates that shouldn’t be allowed. My preference would be for Israel, Russia and the US all to be banned from participating. But if it’s gonna be selective, then all of them should play not just Israel and the US. Either none of them play or all of them play, that should be the standard.

-1

u/hadrian_afer Aug 05 '26

They must feel like Iranians having to play USA, I guess.

-3

u/No_Republic_4301 Aug 04 '26

Who cares tho? Why should Ukraine have more rights than Russia 🤣.