07/06/2018 14:19
Youth Continental Cup Finals to determine European contingent for Buenos Aires
2017-2018 CEV Youth Beach Volleyball Continental Cup
Luxembourg, June 7, 2018. The final stage of the 2017-2018 CEV Youth Beach Volleyball Continental Cup will be taking place in Baden, Austria later this week and namely from Friday to Sunday. The rising stars in European Beach Volleyball will perform on a truly iconic stage at the local Strandbad, right in the outskirts of Vienna. Baden has become known throughout the years as one of the most popular places across Europe when it comes to the organisation of elite Beach Volleyball competitions. The event will determine the European contingent – five teams per gender – for the Beach Volleyball competition of the 2018 Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
A Beach Volleyball competition of international calibre is taking place in Baden for the fourteenth time; 16 countries per gender will take to the sand to fight for a much-coveted ticket to Buenos Aires, where Beach Volleyball will feature on the programme of the Youth Olympics for the second time in a row after its debut at Nanjing 2014.
Mariia Bocharova and Maria Voronina of Russia are among the pre-favourites of the competition in Baden
Among the players competing in Baden, Russia’s Mariia Bocharova/Maria Voronina are the reigning U18 and U20 European champions, while Raïsa Schoon from the Netherlands is the daughter of former Beach Volleyball star, Debora Schoon-Kadijk, a silver and bronze medal winner from the European Beach Volleyball Championship in 1998 and 2000. Schoon and partner Emi van Driel won silver at last year’s U18 European Championship, while Ukraine’s Kateryna Dashevska is a bronze medallist from that same competition (but she will be competing in Baden with a different partner, Sofiia Rylova, replacing Viktoria Lysytsia).
As for the men’s competition, Filip John of Germany is a gold medal winner from this year’s U18 European Volleyball Championship, where he received the award for the MVP as well. Russia’s Pavel Shustrov/Alexey Gusev are the reigning U18 European Beach Volleyball champions, while Luis and Joaquin Bello of England won gold at last year’s Youth Commonwealth Games at the Bahamas.
Pavel Shustrov and Alexey Gusev emerged victorious from an all-Russian final at the 2017 #EuroBeachVolleyU18 in Kazan
Following completion of the qualification stage held in 2017 involving a record-breaking 38 and 41 countries for men and women, respectively, the following 16 nations are due to compete in Baden this weekend:
Men: Austria, Belarus, Czech Republic, England, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Russia, Sweden, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Turkey, Ukraine.
Women: Austria, Czech Republic, England, France, Greece, Italy, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Ukraine.
The organisation of the Youth Continental Cup Final cements Austria’s status as one of Europe’s Beach Volleyball ‘Meccas’ with Baden having hosted last year a highly successful U22 European Championship followed by a double-gender European Masters only one week later. This time around, the Baden Open – a 1-Star event featuring on the FIVB World Tour – will be taking place at the same venue a few days after completion of the Youth Continental Cup Finals.
Baden is hosting the second edition of the Youth Continental Cup Final – after Antalya, Turkey played host to the inaugural event in 2014.
The teams eventually qualified for the 2018 Youth Olympics will be trying to extend Europe’s success story in the competition since Russia’s Artem Yarzutkin/Oleg Stoyanovskiy won gold at Nanjing 2014 while Germany’s Lisa Arnholdt/Sarah Schneider settled for the bronze medal in the women’s tournament.
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