The men’s eighthfinal match-ups were set up at the Sochi 4-star stop on the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour after the second legs of the pool stage and the first elimination round took place on Friday, as the race for precious points on the road to Tokyo picks up heat.
In the second set of the winners match of Pool E, Czechia’s Ondrej Perusic and David Schweiner were pushed into overtime by USA’s Nick Lucena and Phil Dalhausser, but managed to close it off in straight sets at 2-0 (21-16, 25-23). This was the third meeting between these two pairs this year and the Czechs now lead the head-to-head series by two to one.
“I am really looking forward to the draw and in the afternoon we will watch our opponents playing in round one. Let’s hope that tomorrow, in round two, we will perform the same way we did yesterday and today,” Schweiner told Volleyball World after their game.
“It’s always a really difficult match against Dalhausser and Lucena. We won against them in Doha, but they were much better prepared in Mexico and they won. So we also had to change some things in our game and I am really glad that they worked out today,” Perusic added. “There are some really good teams that finished second or third in their pools, so it is going to be really tough tomorrow, but I think we should be more focused on our performance. If we keep up the good performance from the last tournaments, then we really have a chance against the strong teams.”
As it later turned out, Perusic and Schweiner will indeed face a very strong opposition in the eighthfinals, fourth-seeded Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan. The Qatari pair snatched a hard-fought 2-0 (21-19, 25-23) first-round victory over USA’s Jake Gibb and Taylor Crabb and will now be eager to get back at the Czechs for losing to them earlier this year at home, in the Doha quarterfinals.
Oleg Stoyanovskiy against Trevor Crabb at the net
An extended tie-breaker decided the hard-fought battle for the first place in Pool A. Inspired by the home crowd at centre court, top-seeded Russians Viacheslav Krasilnikov and Oleg Stoyanovskiy earned a 2-1 (21-19, 18-21, 16-14) victory over USA’s Tri Bourne and Trevor Crabb. The Americans won their next game, however, and will lock horns with another home team in the eighthfinals, Konstantin Semenov and Ilya Leshukov, who emerged on top of Pool H after an emphatic 2-0 (21-7, 21-14) win over Latvia’s Martins Plavins and Edgars Tocs. It will not get any easier for Krasilnikov and Stoyanovskiy either as their next opponents will be none other than reigning Olympic champ Alison Cerutti and Alvaro Filho of Brazil.
In the Pool D final, Italy’s Paolo Nicolai and Daniele Lupo defeated Cherif and Ahmed in three sets, but had to climb back from a set down on the way to a 2-1 (18-21, 21-17, 15-12) win. So did their compatriots Adrian Carambula and Enrico Rossi against Austria’s Robin Seidl and Philipp Waller to conquer the top of Pool F after a 2-1 (20-22, 21-17, 15-13) victory. The Austrians, however, got back on the winning track and will come across Nicolai and Lupo next, while Carambula and Rossi will have to go against Nick Lucena and Phil Dalhausser.
Philipp Waller and Enrico Rossi on the joust
Poland’s Piotr Kantor and Bartosz Losiak upset the world’s number one team, Anders Mol and Christian Sorum of Norway, in a convincing 2-0 (21-16, 21-18) shutout to top Pool B. In Pool G, Switzerland’s Adrian Heidrich and Mirco Gerson delivered a clean-slate upset of Alison and Alvaro Filho, 2-0 (21-17, 21-19). In the eighthfinals, Kantor and Losiak will play against Switzerland’s Marco Krattiger and Florian Breer, while Heidrich and Gerson will have to face Latvia’s Aleksandrs Samoilovs and Janis Smedins, who knocked Mol and Sorum out in a first-round three-setter. These four teams form the part of the bracket that will be the most interesting to follow on Saturday as three of them are currently very near, above or below, the cut-off line in the provisional Olympic ranking.
Christiaan Varenhorst and Steven van de Velde of the Netherlands claimed the direct ticket from Pool C to the eighthfinals on the wings of 2-0 (21-14, 21-19) victory over Russian main draw newcomers Daniil Kuvichka and Anton Kislytsyn. The Dutchmen will meet Poland’s Grzegorz Fijalek and Michal Bryl next in a duel for a spot in the quarterfinals.
