Rising Beach Volleyball stars from across EEVZA region seek qualification for #EuroBeachVolleyU20

Sixteen teams from eight countries in both the men’s and women’s competition are contesting the Eastern European Volleyball Zonal Association (EEVZA) zonal qualifier in Cesis – where two spots per gender are at stake to compete in this year’s #EuroBeachVolleyU20 scheduled to take place in Italy in September. Young athletes from Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, and hosts Latvia have enjoyed the most promising start to the tournament, with the competition reaching its climax on July 17 with the medal matches. 

In the men’s competition, top-seeded Tomass Blekte and Mārtiņš Pope from Latvia opened the tournament with a hard-fought 2-1 (18-21, 22-20, 15-10) victory over Lithuania’s Orestas Kubilius and Rokas Lukosevicius, but they subsequently lost their second match 0-2 (17-21, 14-21) to Poland’s Witold Witkowski and Maksymilian Dymczyk, who won both of their group stage matches on Wednesday. Patrik Parijõgi/Kaur Koitla and Armin Kender/Artur Tsuhnenkov from Estonia, Kārlis Arturs Mičulis/Bruno Liepiņš from Latvia, as well as Lithuania’s Lukas Gumbelevicius/Danielius Sumeika and Raigardas Macionis/Dovydas Sinkevicius also started their campaign with two victories apiece.

The top-seeded home team had a significantly better start in the women’s tournament, where Paula Krieva and Alise Aleksāne defeated both Ulyana Kovalyova and Dilara Aghayeva from Azerbaijan (21-13, 21-14) and the Ukrainian pair Kateryna Nitsenko and Viktoriia Kachyoni (21-12, 11-21, 15-10). Two victories were also secured by the Polish pair Zuzanna Kudlik and Zuzanna Przybyszewska, the Ukrainians Anastasiia Boiko and Aleksandra Kovalchuk, Estonia’s Hannemai Hanimägi and Marta-Mia Ploomipuu, as well as Karlīna Bērziņa and Monika Mamaja from Latvia.

The group winners will advance directly to the quarter-finals, while their next opponents will be determined by matches involving the second- and third-placed teams.

Since last year, Zonal Associations have the ability to run their own qualifiers for #EuroBeachVolleyU20, thereby providing youngsters with an additional opportunity to play international matches, gain valuable experience, and pursue their dreams of a career in the sport. Each zonal qualifier allocates two direct spots to the Finals to the top two ranked National Federations, provided that a minimum of 40% of the National Federations belonging to the respective Zonal Association participated in the event.

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