A rejuvenated Korean women’s volleyball team looks to redeem itself on the international stage.
The women’s national team, coached by Cesar Gonzalez, will take on host Turkiye in the first round of the FIVB Volleyball Nations League (VNL) 2023, which kicks off on June 1 at 2 a.m. in Antalya, Turkey.
South Korea crashed to the bottom of the table in the tournament last year, losing all 12 matches and failing to pick up a single point. The void left by the retirement of big names like Kim Yeon-kyung (Heungkuk Life) and Yang Hyo-jin (Hyundai E&C) after the Tokyo 2020 Olympics was too great.
This year’s roster is not much different from last year’s.
However, with the addition of Han Yoo-mi, who has been a commentator for broadcasters and lovingly advised her juniors, as the national team coach and Kim Yeon-kyung as an advisor, the younger players are back on the starting line with the expectation that their morale and organization will be much better than last year.
Korea’s women’s volleyball team, which is determined to qualify for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, will compete in the VNL, followed by the Asian Championships in September, the Paris Olympic Qualifiers, and the Asian Games to boost its international competitiveness.
Three of these tournaments, except for the Asian Games, have ranking points that determine the world ranking, and Korea needs to improve its 23rd place ranking as much as possible to qualify for the Paris Olympics.
This year, the women’s qualifying tournament will be held in China, Japan, and Poland from Sept. 16-24, and Korea will compete in Group C, which includes Poland, Italy, the United States, and Thailand.
Twelve nations will compete at the Paris Games, with host France earning one spot and six additional spots going to the top two finishers in each group at this year’s qualifiers. The remaining five spots will be allocated based on world rankings on June 17, 2024.
The best-case scenario for Korea would be to qualify for the Olympics from the qualifiers, but it’s difficult because there are many countries ranked higher than us.토토사이트
Therefore, improving our world ranking is a realistic alternative. To that end, the women’s volleyball team will compete in the Asian Championships (Sept. 2-10 in Thailand) before flying to Poland for the Olympic qualifiers and then on to Hangzhou for the Asian Games (Sept. 28-Oct. 7).
The team’s target for the VNL is at least three wins. In Week 1, South Korea will face Turkiye, Canada (June 2), the United States (June 3), and Thailand (June 4).
The team then travels to Brasilia, Brazil to face Brazil (June 15), Japan (June 16), Croatia (June 17), and Germany (June 19) before returning to Suwon, South Korea to close out the qualifiers with Week 3 matches against Bulgaria (June 27), Dominican Republic (June 29), China (July 1), and Poland (July 2).