03/09/2016 16:45
Latvian red party goes on in Jurmala as home teams progress to men’s semis
2016 CEV Beach Volleyball European Championship - Jurmala Masters
Jurmala, Latvia, September 3, 2016. On Saturday the weather conditions were not as ideal as earlier this week but the next-to-last day of the CEV Jurmala Masters delivered a series of exciting matches as some of the top teams in Europe are vying not only for a spot on the podium of the tournament being held by the Baltic Sea, but also for a quota spot for their National Federation to compete at next year’s FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship in Vienna. And the Latvian audience who, according to the organisers, is becoming more passionate and louder from year to year, was provided with something to cheer about as the top two home teams secured a spot in the semis scheduled for Sunday morning at 10:00 and 11:00am local time.
There is even a chance of an all-Latvian final since Janis Smedins/Aleksandrs Samoilovs and Martins Plavins/Haralds Regza can only cross their paths in the last act of the tournament. They first will have to take on Dries Koekelkoren/Tom van Walle of Belgium and Yaroslav Koshkarev/Ruslan Bykanov of Russia respectively for a spot in the ‘grand finale’.
The Latvian fans did not seem too bothered by the rain and chilly weather and turned out in large numbers to follow the actions of the two home teams still in the race for the medals. Baku 2015 European Games gold medallists Martins Plavins and Haralds Regza played Russia’s rising stars Oleg Stoyanovskiy and Artem Yarzutkin for a spot in the semis. The audience got what they wanted and had come for since Plavins and Regza set the pace of the game from start to end of the opening set, crushing their opponents with an impressive 21-12 win. The course of the match changed in the second set where the Latvians trailed for most of the time, until two consecutive blocks by Regza and a Russian mistake accounted for a Latvian lead at 17-16. This was the turning point of the match and even though the young Russians put up a fight through to the end, the first act of the much anticipated ‘carmine red party’ – carmine red being Latvia’s national colour – got started when Regza and Plavins closed the set out at 22-20.
“We had lost three times in a row 0-2 to this Russian team,” 2012 Olympic bronze medallist Martins Plavins explained. “So we decided to change our tactics and it worked just fine. Haralds scored a number of blocks and I got the job done in defence, so we eventually won.”
Next up were Janis Smedins and Jurmala-native Aleksandrs Samoilovs, the three-time winners of the FIVB World Tour. They played Ukraine’s underdogs Oleksii Denin and Sergiy Popov, and fairly easily claimed the opening set 21-17. Smedins and Samoilovs, who won the CEV Jurmala Satellite in 2014 before settling for the bronze medal at last year’s Masters are trying to rebound from the major setback they suffered at the Rio 2016 Olympics. After netting the bronze medal at the FIVB Grand Slam in Long Beach last week, they very much hope that performing before a partisan home crowd will further help them erase memories from their Olympic ‘flop’.
The second set was almost a remake of what the Latvian fans had witnessed in the previous quarter-final featuring Regza and Plavins. Smedins and Samoilovs had to work hard for their points and even trailed by one or two for most of the time. The crunch time was a real nail-biter with Denin/Popov missing out on a set ball before Smedins stamped a monster block to finish it all off at 22-20 and secure a much-desired semi-final spot for the 2015 European champions.
Dramatic wins for Russia and Belgium
Russia’s Ruslan Bykanov and Yaroslav Koshkarev opened the programme of the men’s quarter-finals on a chilly and rainy Saturday afternoon and eventually progressed to the semis but the second set of their matchup with Austria’s Thomas Kunert and Christoph Dressler was by far the most dramatic of the tournament so far. If Bykanov and Koshkarev dissipated many chances to finish it all off a way earlier, their Austrian opponents did not capitalise on a number of opportunities to extend the match to a third set. After many turnarounds, Bykanov and Koshkarev finished it all off 21-12, 36-34 to keep their perfect record in the competition – they haven’t dropped a set in four matches so far. Bykanov and Koshkarev hope to continue their positive streak on Majori beach – last Sunday they won an EEVZA zonal event at the same venue before staying on for the CEV Masters.
The next quarter-final match was just as exciting with another close, dramatic finish. Belgium’s Dries Koekelkoren and Tom van Walle were the clear-cut favourites going into the clash with France’s newly-formed tandem Youssef Krou and Maxime Thiercy. Though the Belgians won the opening set, Krou and Thiercy showed resilience and composure to come back strong and even had a couple of match balls in the tie-break before the Belgians eventually claimed a ticket to the semis (21-19, 16-21, 21-19). Koekelkoren will now have the time and opportunity to go back to the hotel, rest and tune in to follow the semi-final of the women’s U19 European Championship in Nitra, Slovakia where the young ‘Yellow Tigers’ coached by his wife Fien Callens are playing Russia for a spot in the gold medal match.
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