Player's Guide to Volleyball South Africa Indoor Volleyball Open 2025-28

Line-up (Rule 7.3): there must always be six players per team in play. Before each set, the coach hands in a line-up sheet. It fixes the rotational order, which must be kept for the whole set.

Positions (Rule 7.4): front row 4 (left), 3 (centre), 2 (right); back row 5 (left), 6 (centre), 1 (right, the server).

At the moment of the serve:

• Receiving team: players must be in rotational order. Each back-row player must have part of a foot further from the centre line than the front foot of the matching front-row player (5 behind 4, 6 behind 3, 1 behind 2). In each row, the players must also be in the right left-to-right order. Positions are judged by where the feet touch the floor.
• Serving team (new for 2025-2028): players are free to stand anywhere on their own court at the service hit. They must still serve in the correct order.

After the serve, everyone may move anywhere on their court and in the free zone.

Positional fault (Rule 7.5): if the receiving team is out of position at the service hit, the opponent gets a point and service, and positions are corrected. If the server makes a fault at the moment of the hit, the serving fault counts first.

Rotation (Rule 7.6 and 7.7): when you win the serve back, rotate one position clockwise (2 goes to 1 to serve, 1 goes to 6, and so on). Serving out of order is a rotational fault: the opponent gets a point and the serve, the order is corrected, and any points your team scored from the moment of the fault are cancelled, if the scorer can pinpoint when it happened.

Order (Rule 12.1 and 12.2): the toss decides who serves first in sets 1 and 5. Other sets start with the team that did not serve first in the previous set. Players serve in the order on the line-up sheet. If your team wins the rally, the same server serves again. If you win the serve back, you rotate first, and the player moving from front-right to back-right serves.

Executing the serve (Rule 12.4):

• The 1st referee whistles to authorise it. You then have 8 seconds to hit the ball.
• Hit the ball with one hand or any part of the arm, after tossing or releasing it.
• One toss or release only. Bouncing or moving the ball in your hands beforehand is fine.
• At the moment of the hit, or take-off for a jump serve, you must not touch the court (end line included) or the floor outside the service zone. After the hit you may land inside the court.
• A serve made before the whistle is cancelled and repeated.

Screening (Rule 12.5): your team may not hide the server or the flight of the ball from the receivers by waving arms, jumping, moving sideways or standing grouped. Players of the serving team must not raise their hands above their heads during the serve until the ball has passed beyond the net.

Serving faults (Rule 12.6) lose the serve to the opponent: serving out of order, an illegal serve, or a ball that touches a team-mate, fails to cross the net through the crossing space, goes out or passes over a screen.

Opponents may not block a serve, and may not attack it when it is in the front zone and entirely above the net.

Three hits (Rule 9.1): a team gets a maximum of three hits to return the ball, not counting a block touch. A fourth hit is the fault of "four hits". A player may not hit the ball twice in a row, except after a block or on the team's first hit (below).

What's legal (Rule 9.2):

• The ball may touch any part of the body.
• It must rebound. It must not be caught or thrown, but it can rebound in any direction.
• It may touch several parts of the body at once.
• First hit exception: on the team's first hit, the ball may touch several parts of the body one after another, provided it is all during one action. This is why a double touch on serve receive or a dig is not a fault.

Simultaneous contacts:

• Two or three team-mates touching at the same moment counts as two or three hits (except when blocking). If several reach for the ball but only one touches it, that is one hit. Colliding is not a fault.
• If two opponents touch it at the same time over the net and the ball stays in play, the team receiving it gets three more hits.

Faults (Rule 9.3): four hits; an assisted hit (using a team-mate or an object for support to reach the ball, although a team-mate may hold you back from committing a fault); a catch (the ball doesn't rebound); and a double contact (one player hits the ball twice in a row, or it touches several body parts in succession, outside the first-hit exception).

Net contact (Rule 11.3 and 11.4):

• Touching the net between the antennae while playing the ball is a fault. "Playing the ball" includes take-off, the hit or attempted hit, and landing safely ready for the next action. A player close to the ball who is trying to play it counts as playing it, even without touching it.
• It is also a fault to use the net as a support, gain an unfair advantage by touching it, hinder an opponent's legitimate attempt to play the ball, or catch or hold the net.
• Touching the posts, ropes or the net outside the antennae is not a fault, as long as it doesn't interfere with play.
• If the ball is driven into the net and the net touches an opponent, that is not a fault.

Reaching over (Rule 11.1): a blocker may touch the ball beyond the net if they don't interfere with the opponent's play before the opponent's attack hit. After an attack hit, your hand may follow through over the net as long as the first contact was in your own space.

Centre line (Rule 11.2):

• Your foot may touch the opponent's court, as long as part of that foot stays on or directly above the centre line and you don't interfere with the opponent.
• A foot that goes completely into the opponent's court is a fault.
• Any other part of the body above the feet may touch the opponent's court, provided it doesn't interfere with play.
• You may go under the net into the opponent's space or free zone if you don't interfere, and you may enter their court once the ball is out of play.

Yes, with limits (Rule 13.2). An attack hit is any action that sends the ball towards the opponent, except a serve or a block.

• Front-row players may attack at any height, as long as they contact the ball within their own playing space.
• Back-row players may attack at any height from behind the attack line (3 m line). At take-off, their foot or feet must not have touched or crossed the attack line. They may land in the front zone after the hit.
• In the front zone, a back-row player may only complete an attack hit if part of the ball is lower than the top of the net at contact.

Attack-hit faults (Rule 13.3) include:

• a back-row player completing an attack hit from the front zone when the ball is entirely above the net;
• any player completing an attack hit on the opponent's serve when the ball is in the front zone and entirely above the net;
• the libero completing an attack hit on a ball entirely above the net;
• completing an attack hit above net height on an overhand finger pass from the libero in their front zone;
• hitting the ball in the opponent's space, or hitting it out.

Tipping is allowed, as long as the ball is cleanly hit and not caught or thrown. An attack hit is "completed" when the ball fully crosses the vertical plane of the net or is touched by an opponent.

Who can block (Rule 14.1): only front-row players may complete a block, and part of the body must be higher than the top of the net when they touch the ball. A back-row player or libero who completes a block, or takes part in a completed block, commits a fault. A libero may not even attempt a block.

Block and team hits (Rule 14.4): in indoor volleyball, a block contact does not count as a team hit. After a block touch, your team still has three hits to return the ball, and the blocker may make the first of them.

Other block rules:

• Quick, continuous contacts by one or more blockers during one action are allowed.
• You may reach over the net to block, but you may not touch the ball in the opponent's space before they make their attack hit.
• Blocking an opponent's serve is forbidden.
• Blocking the ball in the opponent's space from outside the antenna is a fault, and so is a ball that goes out off the block.

Limits (Rule 15.1 and 15.6):

• Each team may make up to 6 substitutions per set.
• A starting player may leave the game once per set, and re-enter once per set, but only to their previous position in the line-up.
• A substitute may enter once per set, in place of a starting player, and can only be replaced by that same starting player.
• Libero replacements don't count as substitutions.

How to substitute (Rule 15.10):

• The request is made when the substitute(s) enter the substitution zone ready to play during an interruption. The coach doesn't need to signal, except for an injury substitution or one before the set starts.
• If the substitute isn't ready, the substitution is refused and the team gets a delay sanction.
• Several players can be substituted in one request, but they must all enter the zone together. A team can't make two separate substitution requests in the same interruption, and there must be a completed rally between two requests (except for injury, expulsion or disqualification).

Exceptional substitution (Rule 15.7): if an injured, ill, expelled or disqualified player can't be replaced legally, any player not on court (except a libero or their replacement player) may come on, beyond the normal limits. An injured player replaced this way can't return in that match.

Illegal substitution (Rule 15.9): if play has restarted after an illegal substitution, the opponent gets a point and service, the substitution is corrected, and any points your team scored since the fault are cancelled.

Designation (Rule 19.1): a team may name up to two liberos from its players on the score sheet, recorded on the special libero lines. Only one libero may be on court at a time. The libero wears a uniform of a different dominant colour from the rest of the team, numbered like everyone else.

The libero may:

• replace any back-row player;
• play the ball anywhere as a back-row player.

The libero may not:

• serve, block or attempt to block;
• complete an attack hit from anywhere (court or free zone) if, at contact, the ball is entirely above the top of the net.

Libero sets: if the libero makes an overhand finger pass from inside the front zone, a team-mate may not complete an attack hit on it while the ball is entirely above the net. If the libero does the same from behind the front zone, the ball can be attacked freely.

Libero replacements (Rule 19.3.2):

• They are unlimited and don't count as substitutions, but there must be a completed rally between two replacements.
• The libero can only be replaced by the player they replaced (the "regular replacement player") or by the second libero.
• They must happen while the ball is out of play and before the whistle for service, through the Libero Replacement Zone.
• At the start of each set, the libero can only come on after the 2nd referee has checked the line-up.

If the libero is injured or expelled: a team with two liberos uses the second one. A team with only one may re-designate any player who is not on court at that moment (except the regular replacement player) as libero for the rest of the match.

• Time-outs (Rule 15): each team may request up to 2 time-outs per set, each lasting 30 seconds. Only the coach (or, without a coach, the assistant coach or game captain) can ask, using the hand signal, while the ball is out of play and before the whistle for service. During a time-out, players on court go to the free zone near their bench.
• Intervals (Rule 18.1): every break between sets lasts 3 minutes. The organiser can ask the competent body to extend the break between sets 2 and 3 to up to 10 minutes.
• Changing ends (Rule 18.2): teams change courts after every set except the deciding 5th set. In the 5th set, they change as soon as the leading team reaches 8 points, keeping the same player positions.
• Injury (Rule 17.1): if an injured player can't be substituted legally or exceptionally, they get a 3-minute recovery time, once per player per match. If they don't recover, the team is declared incomplete.
• Warm-up (Rule 7.2): if both teams have already had a court to themselves, there is a 6-minute joint warm-up at the net; if not, 10 minutes. If a captain asks for separate warm-ups, each team gets 3 or 5 minutes.

Minor misconduct (Rule 21.1) isn't sanctioned. The 1st referee gives a verbal warning through the game captain first, then a yellow card. A yellow card is a formal warning: it is recorded on the score sheet but has no immediate consequence.

Misconduct sanctions (Rule 21.3):

• Expelled: you leave the court for the rest of the set and wait in the team's dressing room until the set ends.
• Disqualified: you go to the dressing room for the rest of the match.
• If you are on court, you must be substituted legally (or exceptionally) at once. If that isn't possible, the team is declared incomplete.
• Sanctions are individual, last the whole match and get heavier with each repeat. Misconduct before or between sets is sanctioned in the next set.

Delays (Rule 16), such as slow substitutions, prolonging an interruption, an illegal substitution request or a repeated improper request, are team sanctions:

• first delay in the match: delay warning (no point lost);
• second and later delays by anyone on the team: delay penalty, a point and service to the opponent.