The members of the European Sports Organising Commission 
(ESOC) convened in Luxembourg earlier this week for their annual plenary meeting. It was an opportunity to review plans for an extremely exciting 2018 national team season, which includes the revamped European League as well as the qualification rounds for next year’s EuroVolley.
The ESOC members discussed plans for the coming season with the CEV Volleyball European League featuring a record-breaking number of national teams divided into two tiers – the ‘Golden’ and ‘Silver’ ones. The eventual winners and runners-up from the Golden European League will be progressing to the FIVB Challenger Cup where a spot to compete in the 2019 edition of the FIVB Volleyball Nations League will be at stake.
The 2018 season includes also the qualifying rounds for next year’s EuroVolley – with the next edition of Europe’s premier Volleyball competition being a truly historic one as it will take place across as many as four countries per gender and will feature a total 24 participating teams per gender.
The ESOC positively reviewed the organisation of the first-ever U16 Women and U17 Men Volleyball European Championships held in 2017 – for which the Zonal Associations delivered the first qualifying rounds. The European Sports Organising Commission agreed that such a model, which encourages the involvement and participation of the Zonal Associations, is a truly promising one for the growth of Volleyball across the whole of Europe and ESOC will propose to the Board of Administration to study the possible adoption of such format for other age categories as well.
Finally, the members discussed a number of changes to the existing CEV Volleyball Competitions Regulations and drew up proposals for further analysis and discussion by the CEV Board of Administration at their next plenary meeting mid-May.
CEV Small Countries Association 