02/04/2016 22:39
Italian wild cards cruise through main draw to advance in Kronplatz
2016 CEV Snow Volleyball European Tour
Kronplatz / Plan de Corones, Italy, April 2, 2016. Wild cards Alessandro Carucci/Angelo Maria Mantegazza pleased the home crowd in Kronplatz / Plan de Corones by cruising straight through the main draw rounds on to Sunday’s finals of the 2016 CEV Snow Volleyball European Tour’s last stop. Despite being seeded 27th out of 29 participating duos, the Italian pair won all of their matches without dropping a set!
Two women’s and two men’s teams from Easter weekend’s domestic Italian SnowVolley.it tournament were granted wild cards to play in Kronplatz and after Valentina Favaglioni/Federica Bianchini qualified unbeaten to the women’s finals, Carucci/Mantegazza followed suit on the men’s side and shut out all of their opponents on Saturday. First, they went through sixth-seeded Tomas Pala/Marcel Myslivecek from the Czech Republic with a 2-0 (11-9, 11-7) victory. Then, they sent Austria’s Benedikt Veider/Felix Oberkofler to the losers’ bracket with a convincing 2-0 (11-4, 11-7), and in the third round handed a 2-0 (12-10, 11-4) upset to last stop’s winner Florian Schnetzer from Austria and his German teammate Florian Schweikart, seeded in position 3.
“This is the first time we are playing on the European Tour, but I think we played very well and deserved this qualification,” said 21-year-old Carucci, who normally plays only indoor Volleyball. “I hope we continue the same way tomorrow and earn a medal.”
“I only played Beach Volleyball before and this year is the first time I play on the snow. It is great; it is beautiful!” exclaimed 30-year-old Mantegazza.
Saturday did not offer any further surprises as all teams seeded 1 through 6 and the pair in position 9 qualified among the eight teams for Sunday’s finals.
In addition to Carucci/Mantegazza, top-seeded Germans Benedikt Doranth/Maximilian Hauser, second-seeded Polish-and-Czech duo Michal Matyja/Robert Kufa and fifth-seeded Maciej Klimas/ Kamil Łyczko went through the three rounds undefeated to play for the medals on Sunday.
“It is top level here; we saw a few good teams,” commented Maximilian Hauser. Although for him and his teammate Benedikt Doranth this is the first tournament this year, they have enough points from the previous season to lead the seeding in Kronplatz. “It always feels new to play on the snow, so every year it is a challenge. The other teams already had a few games this season, so I do not think we are the favourites. The chances are quite even. Our first games today were OK, but we are gearing up to play better tomorrow and compete with the big guys.”
“We know some of these teams that qualified for tomorrow. We played against them last year,” added Doranth. “Hopefully, our chances to win are good, but we will see.”
The four pairs that survived the bumpy road of the losers’ bracket to stay in contention were Florian Schnetzer/Florian Schweikart, Tomas Pala/Marcel Myslivecek, fourth-seeded home favourites Antonio Maccarelli/Daniele Gambarelli and ninth-seeded Germans Sebastian Winter/Holger Böhme.
As usual, a Drawing of Lots will be held during the players’ party on Saturday night and the eight duos will be split into two pools of four each. A single round robin will be played in each pool on Sunday with the pool winners and the pool runners-up qualifying for the semi-finals.
For further information visit also the official website www.snowvolleyball.com and the Instagram account @snowvolleyball
|