The Road to Paris: CEV Nations Cup to give Olympic hopes for 35 countries

Few things will be more important in international beach volleyball in the next 14 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 in their Road to Paris.

The Olympic race for the 24 spots in each gender in the beach volleyball tournament of the Paris 2024 Games will go up a notch or two over the next month for European countries with the start of the CEV Beach Volley Nations Cup 2023, which will play a big role in the continent’s qualification pathway that will award one berth per gender in the next Olympic edition.

Between May 12 and June 11, as many as 14 events (seven in each gender) of the Nations Cup Preliminary Phase will be held around Europe, with the winners of the seven men’s pools and the seven women’s groups advancing to the 2023 Nations Cup Finals, which will be held later in the year.

The top three finishers per gender from that event will be one step closer to the Paris 2024 Games as they will be guaranteed in the 2024 CEV Nations Cup Final – Olympic Qualification Tournament, which will see the winners secure a spot for their countries in the next Olympic edition.

Although Europe will certainly have several teams booking their places in Paris through the Olympic Rankings (which will offer 17 berths per gender), the Nations Cup pathway is extremely valuable for nations that don’t have teams competing regularly on the Beach Pro Tour or that barely miss the cut in the international pathway.

As many as 35 European nations will compete in the 2023 Nations Cup, with Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Denmark, England, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Northern Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Scotland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye and Ukraine being involved in the dispute in both genders while Cyprus, Gibraltar, Luxembourg and Moldova will only enter the competition with their men’s teams.

Created in 2022, the Nations Cup has a new format, with each country’s team being formed by two pairs. Each country vs. country duel features matches involving the two teams from each nation and, in case of split victories, a golden set determines the winners of each encounter.

During the Paris 2024 Olympic qualification period, the Nations Cup will serve as the European pathway to the Games, replacing the Continental Cup in their qualification event status after the London 2012, Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Among the players that will try to book their places to Paris via the Nations Cup there will be some who had a great deal of experience in the Continental Cup, including Czech star Markéta Sluková.

The 34-year-old Sluková and then-partner Barbora Hermannová battled to qualify for the Rio 2016 Games in the World Continental Cup, which brings her good memories and also relevant experience in the system.

One of the most interesting aspects of the Nations Cup is that it makes teams from a same country that are typically opponents in international events stand on the same side of the net and defend their flag together.

Dutch Katja Stam had an experience like that in the 2020 CEV Continental Cup Finals, when partner Raisa Schoon and her joined forces with Marleen van Iersel and Pleun Ypma to help the Netherlands take the victory in front of their home fans in The Hague. After the conclusion of the event, the two teams played each other and Stam and Schoon won, claiming the berth to the Tokyo Games.