Volleyball

The FIVB World Ranking is a ranking system for men's and women's national teams in volleyball. The teams of the member nations of FIVB, volleyball's world governing body, are ranked based on their competitions results with the most successful teams being ranked highest. A point system is used, with points being awarded based on the importance of each FIVB International competitions and Continental competitions also. Under the existing system, rankings are based on a team's performance, with more recent results and more significant competitions being more heavily weighted to help reflect the current competitive state of a team. As of October, 2014 the top 3 teams in Men's category are, World's No. 1 Brazil, No. 2 Russia, No. 3 Poland and in Women's category are as follows, World's No. 1 United States, No.2 Brazil, No. 3 China.

 

The ranking system was most recently revamped after the 2006 World League (for men) and 2006 Grand Prix (for women).

 

The rankings are used in international competitions to define the seeded teams and arrange them in pools. Specific procedures for seeding and pooling are established by the FIVB in each competition's formula, but the method usually employed is the serpentine system.

 

Volleyball has a very widely dispersed assortment of countries in its top 20 both on the men’s and women’s sides.  Brazil, Russia, Japan, China, Serbia, the United States, and Cuba place highly in both rankings.  African teams (Egypt, Cameroon, and Tunisia for the men; Algeria and Kenya for the women) also do well.  Volleyball is one of the most popular sports in the Dominican Republic after baseball, particularly among women, and this is reflected in its high placement in the women’s rankings.

 

In the maps is possible to see the countries (divided in men and women) that play volleyball.