2000 Women's Water Polo Olympic Qualifier

The 2000 Women's Olympic Water Polo Qualifying Tournament was the first ever tournament of it's kind, to decide the remaining three competing teams at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, where women's water polo made it's Olympic debut. The Netherlands and Canada already were qualified, after finishing in first and fifth place at the 1999 FINA Women's Water Polo World Cup in Winnipeg, Canada. Australia automatically qualified as the team from the host country.

The tournament was held in Palermo, Italy, from April 22 to April 30, 2000 with twelve competing teams. The first two ranked teams from this tournament would qualify. One team if a team from Africa or Asia was placed eighth or better then this team would be the third qualified. If not, the third placed team in this tournament would qualify. After the preliminary round and a rest day on day four of the event, the top four qualifiers played the third-ranked qualifiers in other groups, taking on the points won in the first round.

Teams

;GROUP A
*wpw|GER
*wpw|GRE
*wpw|ITA;GROUP B
*wpw|CZE
*wpw|KAZ
*wpw|USA ;GROUP C
*wpw|FRA
*wpw|HUN
*wpw|ESP;GROUP D
*wpw|BRA
*wpw|GBR
*wpw|JPN
*wpw|RUS

Preliminary Round

GROUP A

*April 24, 2000
*April 23, 2000
*April 22, 2000

GROUP D

*April 24, 2000
*April 27, 2000
*April 26, 2000

Play-Offs

*April 29, 2000 — 9th/12th place

Finals

*April 30, 2000 — Eleventh place
*April 30, 2000 — Fifth place
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Final Ranking

*"Russia, United States and Kazachstan qualified for the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia"

Individual Awards

*Most Valuable Player:*flagathlete|Yuliya Petrova|RUS
*Best Goalkeeper:*flagathlete|Francesca Conti|ITA
*Best Scorer:*flagathlete|Mercedes Stieber|HUN

ee also

* 2000 Men's Water Polo Olympic Qualifier

References

* [http://www.fina.org/events/WC/Fukuoka_2001/site/olymp_WPwomenresults.html FINA]