25/08/2014 19:00
Germany refers at development program as secret of success in Kristiansand
2014 CEV U18 Beach Volleyball European Championship
Kristiansand, August, 25, 2014. As the participants of the 2014 CEV U18 Beach Volleyball European Championship dust off the sand after an exciting week in Kristiansand, one of the delegations saying goodbye to the idyllic Norwegian city has plenty of reasons to celebrate. Germany won gold medals in both genders, demonstrating a convincing dominance in the under age competition. Three of the semifinalists reaching the last day wore the flag of the Central European country and two of them were proclaimed European champions. “The boys really deserved this victory; they were the best team here. In the case of the girls, it was a little bit unexpected, but if you saw the whole tournament, you could tell that they played constantly their best Volleyball”, expressed Leonard Waligora, German coach and head of the delegation.
The tournament held last week in Kristiansand concluded with the proclaiming of Germany as a great power in under age Beach Volleyball. The duos Julius Thole/Sven Winter and Leonie Klinke/Lena Ottens claimed the highest position of the podiums, thus stating a manifest superiority of the country in the category. “In this age, we have a really great level of players. The girls did a wonderful job and our second team in the boys’ tournament also played very well up to quarterfinals, so I think we can be proud of our whole performance here”, commented the new European champion Julius Thole.
In the boys’ tournament, Julius Thole and Sven Winter established an outstanding dominance in the route to gold, basing their success in their technical display and in 2.04m-tall Thole’s prevalence over the net. “It was a tough tournament for us, but I think we played with a lot of brain and good tactics; even in our most difficult matches, we worked very hard when it wasn’t our best Beach Volleyball”, stated Thole. “The boys had the best blocking of the whole tournament”, analyzed Waligora, “they also were very good with the side-out and they played very well together”.
Physical superiority wasn’t as a ruling factor in the girls’ tournament. Germany’s Leonie Klinke and Lena Ottens produced a sensational collective performance to claim gold after beating Poland’s Aleksandra Stepien/Marta Pietroczuk in the Final. The young German squad showed great rapport and surprising efficiency to pave their way to the top position of the podium. “The reason for our triumph is that the coaches are so good! They make the decisions to choose which players have to play together and they did a great job directing us during the tournament”, expressed European champion Lena Ottens. “The girls are very complete”, evaluated Waligora. “Both can play well at all the aspects of the game, both can hit, both can block…and they also have been very effective with the serve the whole tournament”.
German double gold, together with the fourth place achieved by Koloseus/Seeber in the girls’ competition represented not only an assessment of the brilliant Beach Volleyball generation in the country, but it also implied a recognition of the successful grassroots program in the nation, the staff head member claimed. “Yes, I think that it is the reason. We definitively have a good youth program in Germany. We have a great youth tour, where young players can show their skills. Sometimes they even take part in senior competitions in Germany, so the players have a lot of experience ”, commented Waligora; “We have national and regional tournaments that allow players to improve, so they are traveling throughout the country, playing. Then, we have a lot of coaches working with them, especially beach work, and that’s the good thing about our program”, pointed out Waligora. Being this so, Germany’s achievement lays on hard and continuous work by coaches and development program managers, according to the coach. “This success comes not only for the work we did this year, but also the year before with all the coaches. Whatever happened here, it happened for what we did at home”, stated Waligora.
The future looks bright and promising for German Beach Volleyball after its display in the spectacular U18 continental tournament celebrated in Kristiansand, which presented the upcoming figures of the sport in Europe. All the participating nations in under age levels put their minds now and will aim for glory in the next continental competition, the CEV U20 European Beach Volleyball Championship to be held in Italy on the first week of September.
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