Chery, Creamline to faceoff in PVL Invitational opening

MANILA (UPDATED) – The stage is set for the highly-anticipated and much bigger return of the Premier Volleyball League for its Invitational Conference that will be kicking off on June 27 at the Filoil EcoOil Centre. 

The PVL Invitationals will feature a three-game curtain raiser, highlighted by the matchup of two favorite teams heading to the tournament – the retooled Chery Tiggo Crossovers and the defending champions Creamline Cool Smashers.

The Crossovers will try to test their blue-chip recruits, bannered by Eya Laure, against the intact Cool Smashers, which is expected to parade Phenom Alyssa Valdez already and the addition of beach volleyball star Bernadeth Pons. 

The two squads will be facing off at 6:30 p.m. in the said venue. 

Opening the competition is the F2 Logistics Cargo Movers, squaring off against the newly-formed team Farm Fresh Foxies led by coach Jerry Yee at 1:30 p.m. 

Meanwhile, Cignal HD Spikers will try to score an opening victory when they fight the Petro Gazz Angels at 4 p.m. 

Based on the complete schedule released by PVL on its website, the tournament will last only for a month with most games being played at the Philsports Arena in Pasig City. 

It will have a weeklong break, though, from July 2 to July 10 to give way for the hosting of the country of the Volleyball Nations League (VNL) at the Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay City. 

There will be 11 local teams which have been divided into two groups. The top two teams in each pool advance to the round-robin semi finals which will also have two foreign squads – making it a 13-team competition. 

Teams from the same pool will carry over their head-to-head record into the second round. The top two squads will move to the winner-take-all final, while the third and fourth-ranked teams will compete for the bronze medal.

Squads that will not advance to the next round will move to the classification phase. However, the sixth-placed squad in Pool B will automatically be ranked 13th.

Group A will be composed of defending champion Creamline Cool Smashers, Chery Tiggo Crossovers, PLDT High Speed Hitters, Akari Chargers, and Gerflor.

Group B will consist of six teams: Petro Gazz Angels, F2 Logistics Cargo Movers, Choco Mucho Flying Titans, Cignal HD Spikers, Farm Fresh, and Foton.