(MENAFN- Gulf Times) Iran and China secured their tickets to the 2018 FIVB Men's World Championship yesterday with a day to spare, after both scored straight-set wins that put them beyond reach of any other opponents at the Asian qualifiers in the city of Ardabil. The top two sides of the five-team, single round robin tournament in Ardabil qualify to the 2018 World Championship, which will be jointly hosted by Italy and Bulgaria next year.
Yesterday's results ended Qatar's hopes of qualifying for the Worlds for the first-ever time in history. As a result, Qatar's last match against Iran today will be of no consequence.
Led by Amir Ghafour and Mohamed Mousavi, who scored 16 and 11 points respectively, Iran destroyed Kazakhstan 3-0 (25-18, 25-17, 25-16) with another blocking party of 13 stuffs to 4. The hosts are at the top of the table with an absolutely perfect record after three matches.
Earlier in the day China had shut out Korea 3-0 (25-18, 25-20, 25-23) with Jiang Chuan once again leading the scoring on 14 points. Iran will be competing in the World Championship for the fourth time straight and sixth time overall, after a debut in 1970 and a best ever finish of sixth last time around in 2014.
China will be making their 14th appearance in the FIVB's flagship competition. They first took part in 1956 and have been competing continuously since 1994 in the quadrennial event. China's best ever finish was seventh place twice, in 1978 and 1982.
Play wraps today with South Korea playing Kazakhstan and Iran taking on Qatar. Last month Japan and Australia claimed the other two berths available to Asian teams, through a qualification tournament held in Canberra. Hosts Italy and Bulgaria, defending champions Poland have direct tickets to the FIVB's flagship tournament. France, The Netherlands, Slovenia, Russia, Serbia, Finland, and Belgium from Europe plus Japan and Australia from Asia, and Brazil from South America have already secured their berths through continental qualifiers.
MENAFN1308201700670000ID1095727603
Legal Disclaimer:
MENAFN provides the information “as is” without warranty of any kind. We do not accept any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, content, images, videos, licenses, completeness, legality, or reliability of the information contained in this article. If you have any complaints or copyright issues related to this article, kindly contact the provider above.