Pools set for the Finals in Espinho

With the first serve of the 2025 CEV Beach Volley Nations Cup Finals set to happen on Thursday, the 16 national teams represented in the decisive stage of the tournament in Espinho are now aware of who their first opponents in their path to win gold in Portugal will be.

On Wednesday, one day before the start of the event, the two pools in each gender were determined, setting up what should be exciting duels for the next four days at the popular Praia da Baía. Introduced in the European beach volleyball calendar in 2022, the Beach Nations Cup is an exciting ‘country vs country’ competition which resembles the Davis Cup in tennis.

The eight national teams in each gender were split into two pools of four. The three best teams in each pool will progress to the elimination rounds, with the pool winners advancing directly to the semifinals and countries ranked second and third playing a quarterfinal round.

On the men’s side, the Netherlands, which will be represented by Stefan Boermans/Yorick de Groot and Alexander Brouwer/Steve van de Velde, are the highest-ranked national federation and were positioned as the top team in Pool A.

The Dutch will play defending champions France, which have Téo Rotar/Arnaud Gauthier-Rat and Kéran Duval/Calvin Aye in their team, Spain, which entered Alejandro Huerta/Javier Huerta and Álvaro Vieira/Antonio Saucedo in the tournament, and Lithuania, which sent Robert Juchnevic/Artur Vasiljev and Arnas Rumsevicius/Karolis Palubinskas to Espinho, in the first phase of the event.

CEV Beach Nations Cup Finals – Men

Pool B will have hosts Portugal as the top-seeded country. The home team will have Hugo Campos and João Pedrosa forming one of their teams and brothers Gonçalo and Tomas Sousa joining forces on the other.

The home teams will have Norway, lining up Anders Mol/Christian Sørum and Hendrik Mol/Mathias Berntsen, Austria, which are set to field Julian Hörl/Philipp Waller and Tim Berger/Timo Hammarberg, and Denmark, which will count on Nicolai Hovmann/Christian Andersen and Mads Møllgaard/Kristoffer Abell, as their first opponents.

Pool play for the men in Espinho will go from Thursday to Friday. The quarterfinals will take place on Saturday, with the semifinals and the final scheduled for Sunday.

Germans lead the way among the women 

On the women’s side, Germany are the highest-ranked nation in the continental rankings and were awarded the top spot in Pool A. The country will have reigning European champions Svenja Müller and Cinja Tillmann and the duo of Sandra Ittlinger and Anna-Lena Grüne competing this week in Espinho.

They are in Pool A alongside France’s Alexia Richard/Lézana Placette and Clémence Vieira/Aline Chamereau, the Netherlands’ Emi van Driel/Wies Bekhuis and Mila Konink/Raïsa Schoon and Lithuania’s Monika Paulikiene /Aine Raupelyte and Ariana Rudkovskaja/Skalve Krizanauskaite.     

CEV Beach Nations Cup Finals – Women

Pool B will have Portugal’s Vanessa Paquete/Raquel Lacerda and Gabriela Coelho/Mariana Maia, Ukraine’s Maryna Hladun/Tetiana Lazarenko and Valentyna Davidova/Anhelina Khmil, Spain’s Daniela Álvarez/Tania Moreno and Sofía González/Ana Vergara and Estonia’s Eva Kuivonen/Liisa-Lotta Jürgenson and Heleene Hollas/Keira Lukas.

Pool play for the women will go from Thursday to Friday, when the quarterfinals will also be held in Espinho. The semifinals are scheduled for Saturday and the gold medal match will take place on Sunday.