Why has the World Volleyball Federation not announced the reason for punishing the U21 Vietnamese athlete?

What regulations the U21 volleyball players of Vietnam violated at the 2025 World Championships remains a question mark. The only information provided by FIVB so far: "The Vietnam Volleyball Federation and the athletes will be invited to provide their views in writing. FIVB will not comment further on this issue while the tournament is still taking place."

In addition, FIVB also left open the possibility of continuing to impose a penalty on the Vietnam Volleyball Federation (VFV), with the announcement: "The FIVB Disciplinary Subcommittee will forward the file to the FIVB Disciplinary Council for further assessment of potential penalties that may be applied outside the tournament."

In recent days, the FIVB's ban on Vietnamese athletes has caused a lot of controversy and conflicting opinions. Even the VFV side is currently unclear as to why the Vietnamese athlete was suddenly punished so severely, causing the U21 Vietnam team to have their results annulled (lost 0-3) in 4 matches with the above athlete's participation.

It is unclear why Vietnamese athletes were punished by FIVB. Photo: Volleyball World

VFV General Secretary Le Tri Truong said that on August 13, VFV sent a document to FIVB with the hope that this organization would soon announce the specific reason for the penalty. Mr. Truong said: "Regarding the violation from the athlete or the Federation's perspective, we are still discussing with FIVB, and at the same time affirm that we always comply with the tournament's regulations. We request FIVB to clarify the regulations stated in the penalty notice, to ensure the rights of the athletes and ensure the reputation of VFV".

"VFV and the U21 team both complied with the regulations regarding documents. At the technical meeting before the tournament, no one had any comments. Especially the inspection related to individuals, I have never seen it before.

If the test takes place at the beginning of the tournament, we completely accept it. Even if an athlete is notified that he is not qualified to compete, the coaching board can still calculate the personnel to ensure the results," said Mr. Truong.

In fact, FIVB has only mentioned the issue of Vietnamese athletes not being eligible to compete according to Article 12.2 of the FIVB Disciplinary Regulations 2023; Article 13.5.2 of the Tournament Regulations and Article 14.4 of the Disciplinary Regulations.

U21 Vietnam still plays resiliently after FIVB's penalty. Photo: Volleyball World

According to research, these Articles are general and do not specify anything. The fact that FIVB kept the reason for punishing Vietnamese athletes secret is making it difficult for VFV to prepare the complaint procedures. Even after the 2025 U21 World Championship ends, if FIVB does not announce the reason for punishing Vietnamese athletes, VFV cannot intervene but can only wait.

In the past, FIVB also announced a ban on a group of Rwandan female volleyball players at the 2021 African Championship, but did not give any reason. The case with the U21 Vietnam athletes could be similar. The reasons for the athletes' ineligibility to compete could be related to gender, documents, doping...

U21 Vietnam has two more matches in the tournament. At 8pm on August 15, coach Nguyen Trong Linh and his team will compete for 17th-20th place with Chile, then say goodbye to the world championship with the match for 17th-18th place (if they win against Chile), or 19th-20th (if they lose).

Vietnamnet.vn