Paris gold puts Perusic and Schweiner strongly in the mix
Road to Paris
Few things will be more important in international beach volleyball in the next ten 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.
A 2023 season full of injuries had, for a while, jeopardized Ondrej Perusic and David Schweiner’s hopes of qualifying for the Paris 2024 Olympics, but their victory last Sunday on the Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Elite16 event held in the French capital has put the Czechs strongly in the mix for an Olympic spot via the FIVB Olympic Ranking.
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.
Prior to the Paris Elite16, Perusic and Schweiner, who had only five valid results to their total, were nowhere near the top-17, but the 1,200 points they collected in the French event catapulted them to 18th, just 140 points before the last team to make the cut – the Czechs have now 4,660 points and fewer finishes considered than every team ranking ahead of them.
Germans Nils Ehlers and Clemens Wickler, who took silver in Paris, also strongly benefited from their result, taking their points total to 6,940, good enough to move them up from seventh to third place. Dutch Alexander Brouwer and Robert Meeuwsen, who entered the tournament in tenth place and took bronze, also went up, now ranking eighth, with 6,160 points.
Reigning Olympic and world champions Anders Mol and Christian Sørum of Norway skipped the event, but were able to preserve their lead in the rankings, with 8,500 points. European champions David Åhman and Jonatan Hellvig of Sweden also didn’t play and remained with 6,280 points, going from third to seventh.
Right now, Europe has five other men’s teams inside the qualification zone – Italy’s Paolo Nicolai/Samuele Cottafava (third – 6,940 points), Spain’s Pablo Herrera/Adrián Gavira (sixth – 6,500), Italy’s Alex Ranghieri/Adrian Carambula (ninth – 6,120), Austria’s Alexander Horst/Julian Hörl (12th – 5,460) and the Netherlands’ Matthew Immers/Steve van de Velde (14th – 4,880).
Among the women, the two European teams that made it to the semifinals also moved up with their strong finishes. Bronze medalists Raisa Schoon and Katja Stam of the Netherlands collected 1,000 points, elevating their total to 6,520 and went from ninth to seventh.
Italians Marta Menegatti and Valentina Gottardi, who lost to the Dutch in the bronze medal match, added 900 points and still managed to rank above them, in sixth place, with 6,640 points. Swiss Zoé Vergé-Dépré and Esmée Böbner lost in the qualifier in Paris, but still managed to continue in the top ten, staying in eighth place with 6,060 points.
Besides them, Europe also has teams occupying every position from 11th to 17th in Switzerland’s Nina Brunner/Tanja Hüberli (5,380 points), Germany’s Svenja Müller/Cinja Tillmann (5,340), Latvia’s Tina Graudina/Anastasija Samoilova (5,300), Finland’s Taru Lathi/Niina Ahtiainen (4,960), Czechia’s Barbora Hermannová/Marie-Sara Štochlová (4,680), Austria’s Ronja Klinger/Dorina Klinger (4,380) and Poland’s Jagoda Gruszczynska/Aleksandra Wachowicz (4,340).
The next update of the FIVB Olympic Rankings will be a big one as it will happen following the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships, the event that awards the most points during the qualification period. The men’s and women’s winners of the tournament that will be played from October 6-15 in Tlaxcala, Mexico, will automatically earn a spot for their countries at next year’s Olympic Games.