Turk­ish-cit­i­zen, for­mer T&T se­nior women's na­tion­al team vol­ley­baller Sinead Jack-Kisal and Ecza­cıbaşı Dy­nav­it will open their cam­paign at the 16th FIVB Women's Club World Cham­pi­onship from 7.30 am Thurs­day at the Tian­jin Peo­ple's Gym­na­si­um in Chi­na against 2023 South Amer­i­can Club Cham­pi­onship run­ners-up Ger­dau Mi­nas of Be­lo Hor­i­zonte in Pool A.

Six stel­lar teams from four dif­fer­ent coun­tries will com­pete for the world ho­n­ours in the city of Hangzhou with the six par­tic­i­pat­ing squads sep­a­rat­ed lit in­to two sin­gle round-robin pools of three for the first stage of the tour­na­ment to be played through Fri­day.

At the end of the round-robin phase the top two teams from each pool will ad­vance to Sat­ur­day’s cross-over semi­fi­nals be­fore the World Cham­pi­onship cli­max­es with the medal match­es on Sun­day.

The trio of two-time win­ners' Eczacibasi Dy­nav­it, hosts Tian­jin Bo­hai Bank and Ger­dau Mi­nas are in Pool A while four-time club world cham­pi­ons and last-year's los­ing fi­nal­ist Vak­if­Bank Spor Ku­lubu, Viet­namese new­com­ers Sport Cen­ter I Women's Club of Hanoi and South Amer­i­ca’s con­ti­nen­tal cham­pi­ons Den­til Pra­ia Clube of Uber­lan­dia are in Pool B.

Yes­ter­day, when the tour­na­ment served off hosts Tian­jin Bo­hai Bank stunned Brazil’s Ger­dau Mi­nas in straight while Türkiye’s Vak­if­Bank Spor Ku­lubu of Is­tan­bul lived up to their sta­tus of Pool B favourites and shut out Viet­nam’s Sport Cen­ter I Women's Club of Hanoi.

Even with­out their Cuban-born Turk­ish star Melis­sa Var­gas in play, Chi­na’s Tian­jin Bo­hai Bank mas­tered a con­vinc­ing 3-0 (25-22, 25-16, 25-20) sweep of their first Pool A game against Brazil’s Ger­dau Mi­nas of Be­lo Hor­i­zonte, to the de­light of the home crowd in Hangzhou. Thus, the club from Tian­jin achieved their sec­ond win in the his­to­ry of the Club World Cham­pi­onships, af­ter cel­e­brat­ing vic­to­ri­ous on­ly once dur­ing their two pre­vi­ous ap­pear­ances.

Out­side hit­ter Li Yingy­ing de­liv­ered the match high of 19 points, in­clud­ing two aces and a kill block, for the win­ners. Wang Yizhu and Yuan Xinyue added 11 and 10 points, re­spec­tive­ly. Mid­dle Ju­lia Kud­iess raised five kill blocks to lead Mi­nas with a to­tal of 12 points, while op­po­site Kisy Nasci­men­to fin­ished with 11.

And in Pool B, the most dec­o­rat­ed team in the his­to­ry of the com­pe­ti­tion, Vak­if­Bank Spor Ku­lubu of Is­tan­bul, al­lowed no sur­pris­es against rook­ies Sport Cen­ter I Women's Club of Hanoi and ham­mered out a speedy 3-0 (25-10, 25-15, 25-13) sweep.

The block­ing made the most im­pres­sive dif­fer­ence in the match. Vak­if­Bank raised as many as 19 kill blocks against on­ly three from Sport Cen­ter I. There was a huge dif­fer­ence in at­tack (42-24 in spike kills) and on the serve (4-1 in aces).

Turk­ish mid­dle block­er Zehra Gunes led the win­ning side with 14 points, in­clud­ing six stuffs. Brazil­ian out­side hit­ter and cap­tain Gabriela Guimaraes and Amer­i­can op­po­site Jor­dan Thomp­son put up three kill blocks apiece to fin­ish with 12 points each.

An­oth­er Amer­i­can, out­side hit­ter Alexan­dra Frant­ti con­tributed 11 points to Vak­if­Bank’s suc­cess, while the match win­ner came from a mon­ster block by 20-year-old Ro­man­ian-born Turk­ish op­po­site Alek­sia Karu­ta­su. Sport Cen­ter I’s 21-year-old spik­er Thi Nhu Quynh Vi was the best scor­er of the match with 15 points to her name.

The sec­ond Pool B match is be­tween Sport Cen­ter I and South Amer­i­ca’s con­ti­nen­tal cham­pi­ons Den­til Pra­ia Clube of Uber­lan­dia, Brazil on Thurs­day at 2 am (TT time).

Wednes­day's re­sults

Pool A:

Tian­jin Bo­hai Bank bt Ger­dau Mi­nas 25-22, 25-16, 25-20

Pool B:

Vak­if­Bank Spor Ku­lubu bt Sport Cen­ter I 25-10, 25-15, 25-13

Re­main­ing match­es:

To­day (Thurs­day, De­cem­ber 14):

Den­til Pra­ia Clube vs Sport Cen­ter I, 2 am

Eczacibasi Dy­nav­it vs Ger­dau Mi­nas, 7.30 am

To­mor­row (Fri­day, De­cem­ber 15):

Vak­if­Bank Spor Ku­lubu vs Den­til Pra­ia Clube, 2 am

Tian­jin Bo­hai Bank vs Eczacibasi Dy­nav­it, 7.30 am

Sat­ur­day, De­cem­ber 16:

Semi­fi­nals: 2 am & 7.30 am

Sun­day, De­cem­ber 17:

Third place and fi­nal play­offs: 2 am & 7.30 am.