Head-to-Head · Italy and Australia will meet for the eighth and ninth time in the World League. Italy are unbeaten in their seven previous encounters.
· They have already met twice in 2015. Both matches ended in a 3-1 win for Italy, but marked the first two sets Australia won against Italy in the World League.
· In 2014 these teams met in the Final Round, where Italy won in straight sets and eventually went to the semifinals.
Italy · Italy can win six of their last seven WL matches if they beat Australia twice this weekend.
· After four matches, they have yet to record a straight-set victory this season. This is the longest time from the start of a season since they played all 12 matches in 2008 without recording a 3-0 win.
· They have won the opening set in each of their four matches this season, but lost the second set on three occasions.
· Simone Anzani leads all players in Group 1 with 15 stuff blocks and 0.88 average per set.
Australia · Australia's losing streak of six matches in the WL is their longest since losing their first 14 matches (1999-2014).
· They have not won the opening set in each of their last five matches.
· Australia's Thomas Edgar scored 48 points in total against Italy in the previous two encounters this season. No Italian player scored more than 29 points (Filippo Lanza) in these meetings.
· Edgar's 75 points in total are second-most in Group 1 behind Bartosz Kurek's 89 for Poland.