02/06/2020 18:00
Beach Volleyball players return to action in Czech Republic
News from the National Federations
Prague, Czech Republic, June 2, 2020. National Beach Volleyball competitions resumed last weekend in the Czech Republic. After a long break due to the COVID-19 crisis with many international events cancelled or postponed, the Czech Volleyball Federation (CVF) managed to secure the return of national competition with the women’s Tipsport Beach Series in Litomerice, and a men’s event in Prague.
The top Czech teams, including Marketa Nausch-Slukova/Barbora Hermannova, all competed in Litomerice. Their biggest rivals were Michaela Kubickova/Michala Kvapilova, with these two pairs clashing in the final of the tournament. Although Slukova and Hermannova lost the first set, they did not show any further hesitation in the subsequent two sets and emerged as the eventual winners of the Tipsport Beach Series stop in Litomerice.
Slukova has managed to return home after spending quite some time during the peak of the coronavirus crisis in Europe in Los Angeles together with her husband and coach, Simon Nausch.
A men’s tournament took place in Prague as part of the first Czech Cup. Unfortunately, Czech stars Ondrej Perusic/David Schweiner could not compete together. Ondrej Perusic is currently struggling with an injury, so for this tournament Schweiner’s playmate was the young, talented Stocka. Jan Hadrava and Donovan Dzavoronok (both playing in the elite Italian Superlega) were the surprise package of the competition and used to their advantage the absence of the best Czech team to claim top honours.
The Czech national tour will continue with more tournaments this coming weekend.
“I am glad that after the specific measures adopted by the Czech government for the resumption of competitive sport, we relatively quickly managed to start our national Beach Volleyball tour. I am especially happy with the women’s tour because we managed to secure a new partner and we increased the prize money to 3,000 EUR per event,” says the President of the Czech Volleyball Federation, Marek Pakosta.
Pictures courtesy of Vaclav Kohelka
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