Yantarny, Russia, August 12, 2017. On Saturday, the #CEVSatellite in Yantarny started with matches on schedule for Round 3 of the winners’ bracket. The organisers had to face many troubles after a tornado had stormed over the Baltic Sea, thus affecting also the beach sports complex in Yantarny. However, everything was fixed in time and the matches started according to the initial schedule.

In the women’s Main Draw, the favourites had a quiet day – an easy victory in the third round allowed Germany’s top-seeded Karla Borger/Margareta Kozuch and the girls from the Czech Republic, Karolina Rehackova/Magdalena Dostalova to progress to the semi-finals.
Russia’s Yulia Abalakina/Ksenia Dabizha and Latvia’s Alise Lece/Marta Ozolina, after losing in Round 3, still had the chance of staying alive in the competition via the losers’ bracket. The Latvians managed to do so by beating their compatriots Tina Graudina/Anastasija Kravcenoka in a tough and interesting match. The more experienced Ozolina and Lece emerged victorious at the tiebreak (21-19, 19-21, 15-12). Later in the afternoon, there was another derby to follow. Abalakina and Dabizha could not repeat the achievement of Lece/Ozolina and ended up losing 18-21, 17-21 to another Russian team, Olga Motrich and reigning U22 European champion Svetlana Kholomina, with a spot in the semis at stake.

As for the men’s tournament, Dutchmen Dirk Boehlé/Steven van de Velde beat Austrians Thomas Kunert and Christoph Dressler in two straight, but very close sets (25-23, 24-22) to make it straight to the semis. The second match of the third round was not that close as Youssef Krou and Quincy Aye from France managed to beat Aliaksandr Dziadkou and Aliaksandr Kavalenka of Belarus with a compelling 21-15, 21-12.

The hopes of the Russian fans were still alive as two home teams continued to fight through the losers’ bracket and still had a chance to book a ticket for the semi-finals. However, Ruslan Daianov and Yury Bogatov, winners of a Snow Volleyball European Tour tournament back in April in Plan de Corones, and top seeded Igor Velichko and Maxim Sivolap could not take a single set against their respective opponents, and as a result, Kavalenka/Dziadkou and Kunert/Dressler eventually progressed to the semis.

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