MANILA – Teams in the men's and women's divisions of the Paris Olympics beach volleyball competition are divided into six pools for the first round.
Matches will be held from July 27 to Aug. 10 at the 14,000-seat Olympic beach volleyball stadium at Champ-de-Mars Park.
Defending champions Anders Mol and Christian Sørum of Norway are in Pool B along with Matthew Immers/Steven van de Velde (Netherlands), Alex Ranghieri/Adrian Carambula (Italy), and Marco Grimalt/Esteban Grimalt (Chile).
In Pool A are David Åhman/Jonatan Hellvig (Sweden), Paolo Nicolai/Samuele Cottafava (Italy), Cherif Younousse/Ahmed Tijan (Qatar), and Mark Nicolaidis/Izac Carracher (Australia); while Pool C is composed of Nils Ehlers/Clemens Wickler (Germany), Michal Bryl/Bartosz Łosiak (Poland), Thomas Hodges/Zachery Schubert (Australia), and Julien Lyneel/Rémi Bassereau (France).
Andre Loyola/George Wanderley (Brazil); Andy Benesh/Miles Partain (USA); Noslen Diaz/Jorge Alayo (Cuba); and Mohammed Abicha/Zouheir Elgraoui (Morocco) are in Pool D.
Ondrej Perusic/David Schweiner (Czechia), Evandro Gonçalves/Arthur Lanci (Brazil), Julian Hörl/Alexander Horst (Austria), and Sam Schachter/Dan Dearing (Canada) are in Pool E; while Youssef Krou/Arnaud Gauthier-Rat (France), Stefan Boermans/Yorick de Groot (the Netherlands), Pablo Herrera/Adrián Gavira (Spain), and Miles Evans/Chase Budinger (USA) are in Pool F.
In the women's division, Tokyo Olympics silver medalists Mariafe Artacho and and Taliqua Clancy of Australia will be up against Taryn Kloth/Kristen Nuss (USA), Chen Xue/Xinyi Xia (China), and Heather Bansley/Sophie Bukovec (Canada) in Pool B.
Seeing action in Pool A are Eduarda ‘Duda’ Lisboa/Ana Patrícia Ramos (Brazil), Marta Menegatti/Valentina Gottardi (Italy), Liliana Fernández/Paula Soria (Spain), and Doaa Elghobashy/Marwa Abdelhady (Egypt); while in Pool Care Kelly Cheng/Sara Hughes (USA), Cinja Tillmann/Svenja Müller (Germany), Clémence Vieira/Aline Chamereau (France), and Barbora Hermannová/Marie-Sára Štochlova (Czechia).
Brandie Wilkerson/Melissa Humana-Paredes (Canada), Tina Graudina/Anastasija Samoilova (Latvia), Esmée Böbner/Zoé Vergé-Dépré (Switzerland), and Michelle Valiente/Giuliana Poletti (Paraguay) are playing in Pool D; Carol Salgado/Bárbara Seixas (Brazil), Raisa Schoon/Katja Stam (the Netherlands), Monika Paulikiene/Aine Raupelyte (Lithuania), and Miki Ishii/Akiko Hasegawa (Japan) in Pool E; and Alexia Richard/Lézana Placette (France), Nina Brunner/Tanja Hüberli (Switzerland), Daniela Álvarez/Tania Moreno (Spain), and Laura Ludwig/Louisa Lippmann (Germany) in Pool F.
In the first round, teams face each of their opponents once. At the end of the pool play, the six pool winners, six pool runners-up and two best-ranked third-placed teams will advance to the Round of 16, occupying 14 of the 16 spots available.
The remaining four third-placed teams will play a “lucky loser” round, with the winners moving to the Round of 16.
The Round of 16, quarterfinals, semifinals and medal matches will follow a single-elimination format. (Jean Malanum/PNA)
