Alanya, Turkey, September 15, 2010—Emerging from the pressure of the competition, the intensity of the blazing sunshine and fairly humid conditions, four women’s Beach Volleyball teams, representing four countries, battled through three rounds of qualifying matches Wednesday to advance to the 24-team men’s Main Draw at the 2010 SWATCH FIVB Junior World Championships, the 10th annual event for Beach Volleyball players under 21. The Mediterranean seaside resort city of Alanya is host the 2010 SWATCH FIVB Junior World Championships for men and women two-person teams through Sunday. Alanya is located on the Gulf of Antalya and is situated between the Taurus Mountains to the north and the Mediterranean Sea. Four men’s tandems also advanced Wednesday in the double-gender event to the 24-team men’s main draw, which will also start with two days of Pool Play Thursday and Friday followed by two days of single-elimination bracket play on Saturday and Sunday. The semifinals will be held on Saturday and medal matches for both genders will be played on Sunday on the Alanya Center Court. Six pools with four teams each will play three matches in two days to determine the sweet 16 for the final two days of single-elimination play. The top two teams in each pool plus the four top third place teams will advance to the final rounds of play. The 2010 SWATCH FIVB Junior World Championships are being held at Milli Egemenlik Plaji, Obakoy. Joining the 20 pre-seeded teams to complete the final field in the quest for Mediterranean women’s gold in Alanya are teams from Brazil, Czech Republic, the Netherlands and Russia. All four countries will now each have two teams in the Main Draw as a total of 18 countries are represented among the men’s final 24 teams.
Czech Republic’s Adela Machova/Eliska Galova (No. 5) moved forward with twin two set qualifying wins over teams from Germany (No. 4) and Ukraine (No. 12). In their win over Germany’s Christine Aulenbrock/Cinja Tilmann, Machova/Galova eliminated half of last year’s gold medal winning team in Alanya at the 2009 SWATCH FIVB Youth World Championships in Aulenbrock. Aulenbrock’s partner in Alanya last year is playing in the main draw this year with Chantal Laboureur, who won the gold medal at the 2008 SWATCH FIVB Youth World Championships in The Hague, Netherlands.
A total of 79 teams (38 women’s and 41 men’s) from 32 countries have officially entered the 2010 SWATCH FIVB Junior World Championships. Countries represented are Australia, Austria, Belarus, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Russia, San Marino, Serbia, Slovak Republic, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United States and Venezuela. As the host country, Turkey has six teams (three men’s and three women’s) each pre-seeded into the main draw of their respective tournaments. The men’s teams representing the host nation will be Safak Sezer/Caner Turhan, Candan Ali/Tayga Baltacioglu and Muharrem Akkermik/Taha Altinoz. The three women’s main draw teams from Turkey will be Burcu Atasoy/Gamze Turk, Neslisah Aktas/Burcu Baser and Ceren Atila/Sezin Celik.
Additional event information is available at www.fivb.org as well as at www.beachvolleytr.com. |
