Thessaloniki, Greece, August 26, 2016. Greece’s young Beach Volleyball ambassadors did well during the group stage of the 2016 CEV U22 Beach Volleyball European Championship, at Avant Garde Sports Club, where quite a few spectators witnessed them advancing towards the knockout phase of the tournament.
All six pairs of the host country, three in the men’s and as many in the women’s competition, made it through and will be among the teams who will play in the top 24, starting on Saturday morning in the village of Kardia.
Rafail Baniotis and Georgios Terzoglou finished unbeaten their campaign in Pool B of the men’s competition and qualified directly to the Round of 16, while Vasileios Zisis/Iason Kanellos and brothers Angelos Mandilaris/Vasileios Mandilaris claimed the third place in their respective pools and will now play against other opponents who finished second in their groups, in order to make it to the last 16.
In the women’s division, Dimitra Manavi and Ioanna Parisaki took three victories out of as many matches and progressed straight to the Round of 16, while Tatiana Moldovanidi/Aliki Spiliotopoulou finished second in their pool. Youngsters Maria Klepkou/Paraskevi Kourtidou managed to clinch the third place and with it also progressed to the knock-out phase.
The sad news of the day came with the withdrawal of the Polish U22 men’s pair Mateusz Lysikowski/Mateusz Paszkowski, due to injury, which left Pool B with just three teams.
On the other hand, most of the favourites made it to the last 16 as top-seeders of their pools, including Anders Berntsen Mol and Christian Sandlie Sørum from Norway and 2015 U22 European bronze medallists Igor Velichko and Maxim Sivolap of Russia, who did so despite having lost their opening match in Pool F to a team from Moldova.
The silver medallists from this year's U21 World Championship, Nadezda Makroguzova/Svetlana Kholomina from Russia qualified to the Round of 16 as leaders of their pool, while the Belarusian duo Viktoryia Shalayeuskaya/Viktoryia Siakretava - who earlier this summer won a historic bronze medal for their country at the U20 EuroBeachVolley in Turkey - will have to make their way through Round 2, as they settled for second place in their pool behind Anastasija Kravcenoka and Tina Graudina of Latvia.
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