Gearing up for World League – Team Cuba

We’re in the home stretch. We very well better be, with the tournament coming up so soon! The rundown, once more:

Egypt Portugal
Japan
Iran
Netherlands
South Korea
Finland
Canada
Italy
Argentina
Serbia
Russia
France
Brazil
Germany
Bulgaria
Cuba
USA
Poland

Cuba’s volleyball history is….solid, if not exactly remarkable. Just like every other country on this rundown, volleyball’s part of the sport pantheon in Cuba, but it’s not at the top. Just like fellow NORCECA members Canada and USA (and probably nobody else), it’s not soccer that tops the list — in Cuba, it’s baseball. Baseball is the national sport of Cuba — former dictator (and perhaps I use the word ‘former’ loosely) Fidel Castro played the game himself. So it’s not volleyball that every Cuban boy grows up playing. The next most popular sport is probably boxing, then track and field athletics. Volleyball comes somewhere after.

But the national team have been fairly successful. They won Olympic bronze back in 1976, and for a more recent result, how about silver at the last world championship. They’ve won the World League once, back in 1998, one of nine total medals (including last year’s bronze). They’re two-time defending NORCECA champions, having beaten the Americans to win gold in both 2009 and 2011. The next edition of that event takes place later this summer. They’ve never truly dominated, except perhaps at the NORCECAs where they have 15 gold medals, and their last heyday of high contention seems to have been the late 90’s (for instance, 2012 was their first World League medal since 2005, and that one was their first since 1999, before which they medalled regularly). But they’re always there.

There is a professional league in Cuba, but as you may be aware, that’s largely because the Cuban people can’t exactly leave the island. That’s starting to change — earlier this year the much-reviled exit-visa restriction was lifted, but certain professionals in vital fields, Communist Party officials, and oh yes, sports people, are still under the older restrictions. Which, yes, were somewhat more liberal than the old policies for ‘normal’ people, but there’s still a bit of a ball of a wax with regards to sports people, and volleyball players specifically.

The current case involves wunderkind Wilfredo León. Last year, he led Cuba’s bronze-medal winning team as an 18-year old, serving as the team’s floor captain. Much like Osmany Juantorena and Robertlandy Simón before him, León has found himself in the position of an overseas club offering him a tremendous salary to come play for them. For reasons I don’t really understand, the Cuban federation apparently have the power to bar a player from club play for 2 years (or 4 as it seems in León’s case). I don’t quite how get that works — the country you’re leaving has the power to bar you? Nonetheless, this article makes it clear enough; León is out, and so too is setter Yoandri Díaz.

The Cuban team is worse off for the loss. The floor captain is now setter Lian Sem Estrada, who was on Cuba’s roster last year, and is in fact a multi-year veteran of the national team, but he’s never seen a regular role. Liberos Gustavo Leyva and Keibel Gutierrez are among those who were with the team last year at the finals in Bulgaria who return this time around. Also fitting that bill are outside hitter Rolando Cepeda, middle blockers Danger Quintana (sorry, but it’s pronounced “Don-hair”), David Fiel, and Isbel Mesa, and all-rounder Lazaro Fundora.

Given that the expulsions of León and Díaz apparently came after the rosters were  formulated for 2013 (both are listed on the FIVB’s page for the Cuban team), it suggests they’ll play two men short, or that these two will be replaced by relative unknowns. Either way you cut it, the team is worse off for their loss.

So are we looking at a winner?

Nope. Russia and Italy are just too strong. If the Cubans were in Pool A, I’d give them a puncher’s chance against the Poles, who are bound to come back to earth, the Americans, from whom I really don’t know what to expect, and the Bulgarians, who admittedly made the most of host nation exemption into last year’s finals but still kinda stick out in that crowd. But Russia and Italy in their pool? Yeah, good luck next year.