Ljubljana, Slovenia, July 22, 2017. The final day of the 2017 CEV Beach Volleyball Satellite in Ljubljana offered some exciting actions, lots of sun and crowned Kim Behrens and Anni Schumacher from Germany with the title of champions after impressing over the last two days.
The competition day started with the semi-final matches, where at the beginning the top seeded Behrens and Schumacher easily overcame the Ukrainian twin sisters Inna and Iryna Makhno by 2-0 (21-15, 21-15). In the second semi-final match Romania’s team of Adriana-Maria Matei and Beata Vaida and Slovenia’s duo Tjasa Jančar and Tjasa Kotnik delivered a more interesting match and a tight score in the first set. The Romanians showed more stamina and secured a 2-1 (22-24, 21-14, 15-6) win and took their ticket for the finals.
In the bronze medal match Jančar and Kotnik gave their best to thank the home crowd for the support through the whole tournament. After the first set they stepped up their game and took the second one, but the Ukrainian twin sisters claimed the 3rd place, and the bronze medals, with a 2-1 (21-13, 18-21, 15-6) win.
In the big final the German team started a bit reserved and lost the first set appearing to struggle to deal with the style of play presented to them by the Romanian team. After that Matei and Vaida lost their pace and the top ranked players of the tournament adapted their style to win the title 2-1 (16-21, 21-17, 15-10), much to their delight.
“It was really hard to play this tournament as this is already our third weekend away from home after the tournaments in Turkey and Poland. The weather here in Ljubljana was really hot, it was hard, but we did a good job in all matches. We went for the gold, we put all energy into it and the result came,” Kim Behrens said after the final win.
After achieving their best ever result, the Romanian team left the court and the tournament happy. After their semi-final success we caught up with the eventual silver medallists for a quick talk about the event, Beach Volleyball and the sport in their country.
To see the full results from the Satellite event click here
Teams from Switzerland took all the glory in Pool E of the CEV Youth Beach Volleyball Continental Cup tournament in Ljubljana. The women's final was tight until the last point, but Mara Betschart/Céline Baumann were the ones taking the win in their clash against Kaja Kersnik and Nika Bevc from Slovenia. “We are sorry we didn't win this final, but we can be really satisfied with our performances in the tournament. We fought really hard, we played good especially in defence, but there is still a lot what we have to improve on until our next competition,” Nika Bevc from the Slovenian team said after the ceremony. Switzerland and Slovenia progressed to the final stage of the Youth Continental Cup scheduled for next year where five tickets to the Buenos Aires Youth Olympics will be up for grabs.
To see the full Youth Continental Cup results and photos click here