Lausanne, Switzerland, June 8, 2017 - The Netherlands meet Portugal Friday in Ceske Budejovice for the 13th time in FIVB World League history, with the Dutch 7-5 ahead in the head-to-head series.
Head-to-Head• Netherlands have won seven of their previous 12 World League meetings with Portugal.
• These nations played each other twice in last season's World League. Netherlands won the first meeting in straight sets, after which Portugal bounced back with a 3-1 victory.
• Portugal could win six World League matches against a specific opponent for the first time. They have now won five against Japan, Netherlands, Finland and Argentina.
Netherlands• Netherlands opened their 2017 World League campaign with a straight set win against Egypt, but failed to win their following matches against China (3-1) and Turkey (3-2).
• Netherlands have not lost three successive World League matches since a run of seven defeats in 2010.
• Netherlands have won at least one set in each of their last 11 World League matches, since the 3-0 defeat to Turkey last year.
• Wouter Ter Maat is currently the fourth-best spiker in Group 2 of the competition with a success rate of 60%. Ter Maat has also scored most points for Netherlands so far this World League season (38 points).
Portugal• Portugal won one of their three World League matches last week, a 3-2 win against Japan. They failed to beat Australia (3-2) and Slovakia (3-0).
• Portugal have already won as many matches this year as they did in their first six matches in last year's edition.
• Three of Portugal's last five World League victories have come in five sets, including a 3-2 win against Netherlands.
• Brothers Alexandre (51) and Marco Ferreira (50) are both in the top five of the Group 2 top scorers list.
• Alexandre Ferreira has scored a joint-high five aces so far in Group 2, alongside Turkey's Arslan Eksi and Finand's Sauli Sinkkonen.