Here’s the rest of the news taken from the FIVB website:
FIVB President Dr. Acosta looks back fondly upon 24 years of unparalleled success and expresses confidence in incoming President Jizhong Wei following 31st FIVB World Congress in Dubai
Dubai, United Arab Emirates, June 18, 2008 – Dr. Rubén Acosta looked back fondly upon the progress of Volleyball during his 24 years as President of the FIVB and expressed his trust in the future of the sport under incoming President Jizhong Wei at a press conference Wednesday following the 31st FIVB World Congress in Dubai. “We have accomplished the first two phases in the life of our organisation,” said Dr. Acosta. The first phase was until 1984 under the leadership of Paul Libaud for 37 years and I would like to pay homage to him. The second phase has taken 24 years and in those years we have been trying to find our way and have achieved a series of improvements. The third phase starts with the election of Mr. Jizhong Wei.
“I’m sure Mr.Wei will bring new fresh ideas to our sport. It is not just a matter of age, it is a matter of competence. He will bring new ways, a new image. I wish him good luck,” said President Acosta, who also took the opportunity to pay a special tribute to the World Congress Guest of Honour and organisers.
“I want to express our sincere and heartfelt thanks to Guest of Honour H.H. Sheik Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum to accept and patronise this 31st FIVB World Congress, the gathering of the biggest sports conference in the world,” said Dr. Acosta. “It was the best World Congress ever organised. I give my sincere thanks to the people of Dubai and the United Arab Emirates Volleyball Association.”
Following an FIVB Board of Administration decision approved by Congress that elections be in line with the Olympic cycle, Wei will be President until elections in 2012, beginning his term after the Beijing Olympic Games.
“During my term my task is to implement and accomplish all the projects already initiated by Dr. Acosta. We may have fresh ideas but these ideas started under the guidelines set up by the President,” said Wei. “The most important legacy is the intellectual legacy of Dr. Acosta that has come from 24 years of hard work accumulated. These are my feelings as I take the baton from the hand of the President.”
Dr. Acosta was elected President of the FIVB for the first time at the 19th FIVB World Congress in Long Beach, Calif., USA, in 1984, taking over from founding President Libaud. As Volleyball’s ambassador, President Acosta tirelessly promoted the sport worldwide and oversaw the spectacular development of Volleyball into the success story it is today, changing the face of the game to attract fans, sponsors and television through innovative management, creation of events and rule changes such as the Rally Point System.
Part of Dr. Acosta’s legacy is handing over to First Executive Vice-President Wei the largest sporting federation in the world in terms of Members, with the President responsible for increasing the number of affiliated National Federations in the FIVB from 154 to 220. The crowning achievement after 24 years of peerless leadership was in realising his and wife Malú Acosta’s dream of creating a fitting home for Volleyball’s future generations. The result of their endeavour was the creation of “Château Les Tourelles,” FIVB’s stunning new headquarters on the banks of Lac Léman in Lausanne, Switzerland.
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There are 5 comments to this entry
Wow! That was a lot of information…
Excited to see the implementation of these changes with the sport.
It’s good to see that volleyball continues to grow and develop! YEY!
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Thanks for appreciating it. All information are found in the FIVB website. It is also good to know that the next FIVB president will be Jizhong Wei, who happens to be the AVC president. It will not be far to think that RP will see again FIVB international sanctioned matches played. As for the meantime, we are contended with our local competitions that becomes more exciting and thrilling to watch. Cheers!
with Jizhong Wei as the next FIVB president, I do hope that Philippines will be chosen as venue for at least a single leg of the World Grand Prix in 2009, similar to the time when the Russsian, Cuban, Brazilian, and Italian teams visited us in the early 2000’s. Those games were then held at the ULTRA.
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Gentleman,
Greetings.It has been an eventful olympic games as far as volleyball is comcerned since we saw the advent/revival of team USA led admirably by the MVP Clayton Stanley on the field and by the genial Kiwi Hugh McCoughteon of the field.Overall it was great for team USA with the men winning gold,the women geting the silver and winning both the men/women gold medals in beach volleyball.
As regards the new rules being contemplated i.e. introduction of two libero’s,increasing the bench strength to eight(totally having fourteen players) and reducing the airpressure and changing the ball,I feel in all probability these changes are going to hurt the puritan’s a lot.The biggest change initiated was the introduction of the rally system of scoring,followed by the introduction of libero,allowing the ball to make contact with the net on serve also have caused enough heartburn for the diehard volleyball fan.It was contemplated at one time to make it discretionary for the first referee to blow the whistle for a net violation/net contact of the block both by the attacker and the blocker.Thank god,that plan has been shelved,otherwise it would led to lot of favouritism/bipartisan attitude.
The introduction of two libero’s to ensure more defence albeit with only one being on the field would defy logic.You have to ensure that both the libero’s are on the field to ensure better defence,as now you have your libeo always playing at the left extreme of the court i.e. zone number five.If the other libero is allowed to play then ,toghether they can cover the court better by dividing the backcourt in to two imaginery halves and leaving one attacker free for back court attaack.As we had seen in the just concluded olympics inspite of the fact that they have reduced the air pressure and also the new ball was played it didn’t effect the pattern of play.The game was not that defencive.Attackers did make a mince meat of the balls set perfectly.
Well,this is my assessment having been a volleyball player myself at the national level for my country India.
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Hmm, you’ve got an interesting point there regarding the two-libero rule. I guess the FIVB didn’t really want a drastic change yet so there should still be just one libero at all times inside the court…