Madrid welcomes the U18 EuroBeachVolley

The 2023 senior, U22 and U20 European beach volleyball champions have already been crowned and the last continental titles of the season will be in contest this week, when the Spanish capital Madrid hosts the U18 EuroBeachVolley.

The Age Group tournament will be played over five days at the Parque Deportivo Puerta de Hierro, which hosted a Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Futures event and the CEV Nations Cup Preliminary Phase earlier this year, and will feature 37 men’s and 34 women’s duos.

As many as 36 European nations will be represented in the event – Andorra, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, England, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Scotland, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye, Ukraine and Wales.

The tournament begins with the qualifier on Wednesday, when four women’s duos – Türkiye’s Ceylin Sayar/Su Simdim, Moldova’s Valeria Gherman/Daria Usatova, Ireland’s Angela Mulcahy/Aoife Burke and Wales’ Eleni Constantinou/Nicky Bacon-Peniche – and seven men’s tandems – Croatia’s Oliver Škorić/Toni Mišura, Slovakia’s Jonas Janovec/Lukas Vasicko, Andorra’s Gil Moliné/Nahuel Tagliaferro, Scotland’s Keir Paterson/Noah Yuda, Serbia’s Aleksa Sipetic/Marko Skuletic, Azerbaijan’s Muhammad Aslanli/Nariman Bayramli and Ireland’s Stepan Potapov/Ethan Moloney-Illien – will fight for the final two spots in the main draw in each gender.

The women’s field in Madrid will include several players who already had success in Age Group European Championships. Among them is Swiss Muriel Bossart, who won the U18 EuroBeachVolley in 2021 and took silver at last week’s U20 EuroBeachVolley with Leona Kernen. This week, the 17-year-old Swiss will be playing with Livia Stolz.

Also guaranteed in the main draw in Madrid, 16-year-old Austrians Lia Berger and Lilli Hohenauer took silver at last year’s U18 EuroBeachVolley. The two were very close to winning another medal at the U20 European Championship last week in Riga, but had to settle for fourth place.

Latvian Līva Ēbere, 15, who took silver at last year’s U20 EuroBeachVolley and will be competing with Marta Gintere, and Spanish Sofía Izuzquiza, who claimed bronze at this year’s U22 EuroBeachVolley and will have Marta Carro as a partner, complete the list of medalists entered in the event.

The men’s event in Madrid will count on two Age Group European Championship medalists – Danish Andreas Brinck, who took silver at last year’s U18 EuroBeachVolley and will be paired with Villads Napier, and Belgian Hendrikx Daan, who won bronze at the same event and will compete alongside Zeno Van Hout.

After Wednesday’s qualifier, the main draws on both genders will be set, with 32 teams confirmed. The tournament continues with pool play, having the duos split into eight groups of four. The top team in each pool will advance directly to the Round of 16, with the second and third-placed sides going to the Round of 24. The medals matches will be played on Sunday in Madrid.