Müller and Tillmann gain ground on Olympic Ranking with Hamburg bronze
Road to Paris
Few things will be more important in international beach volleyball in the next 11 months than qualifying for the Paris 2024 Olympics. The race to be a part of sports’ greatest event is always fascinating and generates endless interesting storylines involving the top teams in the world. We will be following the Olympic qualification process throughout the entire period and will also present some articles that will help you understand how it works and introduce you to some of the stars of the sport that will be chasing something special on their Road to Paris.
Winning bronze at home at last week’s Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Hamburg Elite16 has placed Svenja Müller and Cinja Tillmann closer to the Paris 2024 Games as the Germans moved up on the FIVB Olympic Ranking following its most recent update.
The rankings, which will determine 17 of the 24 teams that will compete in next year’s Paris Olympics, are formed by the total points earned by teams considering their best 12 results in international and continental tournaments played until June 10, 2024, when the 17 best-ranked men’s and women’s teams will secure a spot in the Games.
Müller, 22, and Tillmann, 32, had entered the qualification zone for the first time earlier in August, following the Montréal Elite16 event, but the 1,000 points they collected with their podium appearance in Hamburg have placed them in a much safer position, now ranked 13th with 4,740 points.
Nina Brunner/Tanja Hüberli and Laura Ludwig/Louisa Lippmann, who finished fifth in the German event and earned each 760 points, also managed to improve their situations. The Swiss now have 4,780 points and went from 14th to 12th, while the Germans gained one position, going from 27th to 26th, but are now much closer to the teams ranked above them with 3,120 points.
Three European teams remain in the top ten of the Olympic Rankings – Italy’s Marta Menegatti/Valentina Gottardi (seventh – 5,740 points), Swiss Zoé Vergé-Dépré/Esmée Böbner (eighth – 5,720) and the Netherlands’ Raisa Schoon/Katja Stam (ninth – 5,520).
Also inside the qualification zone are Latvia’s Tina Graudina/Anastasija Samoilova (11th – 4,960), Finland’s Taru Lathi/Niina Ahtiainen (14th – 4,500), Poland’s Jagoda Gruszczynska/Aleksandra Wachowicz (15th – 4,340), Czechia’s Barbora Hermannová/Marie-Sara Štochlová (16th – 4,280) and Spain’s Liliana Fernández/Paula Soria (17th – 4,260).
The men’s winners in Hamburg, Swedish David Åhman and Jonatan Hellvig are now back in third place and fully recovered from the fall they suffered while sidelined due to injury. With the 1,200 points collected with their victory in Germany, the two-time European champions now have 6,280 and are firmly in the top three.
Norwegians Anders Mol and Christian Sørum, who took third in Hamburg, didn’t collect as many points as they did in past events (1,000), but remain clear at the top of the rankings with 8,500.
Also in the top five are Italians Paolo Nicolai and Samuele Cottafava, who took silver in Hamburg and elevated their total to 6,180, going from seventh to fourth, and Spanish Pablo Herrera and Adrián Gavira, who were passed by the Italians and are now fifth with 6,100 after their fifth-place finish in Germany.
Three other European teams are inside the top ten – Germans Nils Ehlers and Clemens Wickler, who are seventh with 5,840 points, Italians Adrian Carambula and Alex Ranghieri, who rank eighth with 5,660, and Dutch Alexander Brouwer and Robert Meeuwsen, who are in tenth place with 5,160.
Also included in the qualification zone right now are Austria’s Alexander Horst/Julian Hörl (14th – 4,560) and the Netherlands’ Steven van de Velde/Matthew Immers (15th – 4,540).
The Olympic Rankings will now stay still for a few weeks before its next significant update, which will happen at the conclusion of the Paris Elite16 event, which will be held from September 27-October 1.