Perfect week for USA in VNL

The United States emerged on top of the current standings after competition week two in the women’s 2026 Volleyball Nations League (VNL), after winning all four of their matches in Pasig City and collecting the full 12 points. Turkiye capitalized on their home court advantage in Ankara and also registered four wins last week, but two of them came after five-set battles costing the team valuable points.

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USA swept their first three matches in the Philippines in straight sets. They shut out the Dominican Republic, Czechia and, most importantly, the world’s number one team – defending VNL titleholders and reigning world and Olympic champions Italy. In their fourth game in Pasig City, the Americans allowed Serbia a set, but still picked up the full three points, eventually topping the current VNL standings on a 7-1 win-loss record and 20 points, edging Brazil on set ratios. USA also gained ground in the FIVB World Ranking, jumping three positions up from number seven to number four.

Despite a five-set scare against Serbia, the Italians did win their other three matches in Pasig City and improved to 6-2 and 18 in third place. On Sunday, they scored a particularly important victory over one of the first week’s unbeaten teams – Japan – and did so in straight sets, handing the Asian team their second defeat of the season, after the previous day’s shocking four-set loss to winless Dominican Republic. With that first VNL 2026 victory, the Caribbean Queens pushed up from the relegation spot in the table, while Japan ended the week in fifth place on 6-2 and 16. Meanwhile, Serbia reached their third and fourth tie-breakers of the season, against Japan and Italy, but are yet to win one, currently taking 13^th place on 2-6 and 10.

Turkiye were the other team to collect four wins during the week and also climbed up the World Ranking – by two positions to number three. They swept their encounters with Belgium and France in straight sets, but when it came down to entertaining Germany and China in their last two games at home in Ankara, they had to resort to tie-breaker resolutions. Nearly 10 thousand cheered on as Melissa Vargas delivered a match-high 32 points to lead her team on a furious reverse sweep of Saturday’s match with Germany. Well over 11 thousand attended Sunday’s game with China, in which the home team had to come back from a set down to claim the victory, once again carried by Vargas, this time with a match-high 36 points.

Also playing in Ankara, but not facing the home team, Brazil, who were undefeated table leaders at the end of week one, kept their status almost through the end of week two – with wins over France (3-0), Belgium (3-2) and China (3-1) – but on Sunday, they suffered their first defeat of the season in a nail-biting clash with Germany, decided in the overtime of the fifth set, and gave up the top spot in the standings to the United States. In the same pool, France lost all four of their matches and dropped to the relegation zone in the table, 18^th place on 1-7 and 4, a point behind the Dominican Republic.

Poland, fourth on 6-2 and 17, and Canada, seventh on 5-3 and 15, are the other two teams currently above the cut-off line for the Finals in Macau. Last week, they played in Bangkok, where Poland collected the full nine points from their first three matches, but in the last one on Sunday, their streak was snapped by Canada in a five-set battle. The North Americans also lost only one of their three games in Thailand and that was on Saturday against the home team. Capitalizing on the home-court advantage and the support of an over 5000-strong crowd, Thailand registered their first two wins of the season, a shutout of Bulgaria and a four-setter against Canada, to distance themselves from the relegation zone.

During the week, Canadian opposite Kiera Van Ryk also achieved an important milestone, scoring her 1,000^th career point in the VNL. By the end of the week, she was already at 1,064, and also the leader in three of the individual rankings in VNL 2026 – for best scorers, for best attackers and for best servers. Her teammate and captain Emily Maglio is on top of the best blockers chart. Serbia’s Sladana Mirkovic and Bojana Gocanin lead the rankings for best setters and for best receivers, respectively, while France’s Juliette Gelin is number one among the best diggers.

More individual milestones were registered during the week. Poland’s Magdalena Stysiak jumped over the 1,200-point mark in the VNL, while Serbia’s 21-year-old middle Hena Kurtagic piled up over 100 kill blocks in the competition. Thailand's Piyanut Pannoy and China's Gong Xiangyu each played her 100^th VNL match, while Belgium’s outside hitter Britt Herbots tied Turkish counterpart Ebrar Karakurt’s all-time record of 1,328 career VNL points scored.

The deciding third competition week in the women’s VNL will offer another 36 matches, split among Osaka in Japan (Brazil, Japan, Poland, Thailand, Turkiye and USA), Hong Kong in China (Belgium, Canada, China, Dominican Republic, Italy and Ukraine) and Belgrade in Serbia (Bulgaria, Czechia, France, Germany, Netherlands and Serbia) from July 8 to 12.

VNL 2026 schedule and results
VNL 2026 ticket information

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