VNL: Canada Defeats Iran
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Canada completed a perfect streak during week two of the Volleyball Nations League (VNL) with a comfortable straight sets victory (25-23, 25-22, 21-25, 25-21) over Iran.
Ryan Sclater smashed down 16 winners on offense and had the knack of saving his most telling contributions for vital stages of the game as Canada won its third straight to cap off an ideal week in San Juan, Argentina.
Stephen Maar backed up Sclater with 13 total points as the Canadians bounced back from a surprising collapse in the third set to hold on for another vital victory, to give their chances as a VNL finals place a further boost.
Amir Ghafour battled bravely for Iran, snapping off 15 spike winners plus four blocking kills, and spearheaded his team’s third set revival.
Iran will hope to get its campaign back on track with a trip to Russia, where it will meet the host nation, China and Brazil.
The competition is being held from May 25 to July 8 in 22 host cities.
The 16 teams compete in a round-robin format with every core team hosting a pool at least once. The teams are divided into four pools of four teams at each week and compete five weeks long, with a total of 120 matches.
The top five teams after the preliminary round join the host of the final round to compete in the final round.
The relegation takes in consideration only the 4 challenger teams. The last ranked challenger team plays the promotion play-off against the Challenger Cup winners. The winners of the play-off will qualify for the next edition as a challenger team.
