The new US pairing of Katie Horton and Julia Scoles will take on Czechia’s Barbora Hermannova and Marie-Sara Stochlova in one of the women’s semifinals at the first Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Challenge event in Dubai on Tuesday. The other battle for a spot in the gold medal match will feature China’s Xia Xinyi and Lin MeiMei against Thailand’s Taravadee Naraphornrapat and Worapeerachayakorn Kongphopsarutawadee.

· Watch all matches at the Beach Pro Tour Challenge event in Dubai live on Volleyball TV.

On Monday, Horton and Scoles, who made their international debut as a team in Saturday’s qualifiers and entered the main draw in seed 19, added two wins to their sensational campaign and made it to the semifinals. In their round-of-16 game, the American pair knocked out Switzerland’s Menia Bentele and Anna Lutz by 2-0 (21-14, 21-18). The quarterfinals presented them with the heavy task of facing the top-seeded team of Isabel Schneider and Julia Sude, but they were able to overcome the Germans after an extended second set, 2-0 (21-16, 25-23), capitalising on the many opponent errors.

Second-seeded Hermannova and Stochlova of Czechia were the first team to book a spot in the Dubai semifinals. They started their day with a speedy 2-0 (21-14, 21-13) shutout of Germany’s Leonie Kortzinger and Lea Sophie Kunst in the round of 16, but then had a hard-fought quarterfinal encounter with USA’s Savannah Simo and Jessica Gaffney, outplaying the opponents mostly from the serving line. After dropping the second set in overtime, the Czechs dominated the tie-breaker to celebrate a 2-1 (21-18, 20-22, 15-8) victory. It was the second time Hermannova and Stochlova reach the last four at a Beach Pro Tour stop, after claiming silver in Agadir in July.

Xia and Lin had a really tough first match on Monday. The fifth-seeded Chinese pair edged Germany’s Anna-Lena Grune and Sarah Schulz deep into the tie-breaker overtime to claim a 2-1 (21-17, 20-22, 18-16) victory. On the way to the semifinals, Xia and Lin managed to shut out Xolani Hodel and Hailey Harward by 2-0 (21-18, 21-15) taking advantage of the American qualifiers’ abundant unforced mistakes. It will be the first semifinal at the Challenge level for the Asian duo. They have already collected a full set of hardware at the Futures level of the Beach Pro Tour.

Naraphornrapat and Worapeerachayakorn had to deal with two three-setters in Monday’s playoffs, both against Asian rivals. The fourth-seeded Thais came back from a set down against China’s Zeng Jinjin and Wang Xinxin in their round-of-16 fixture to take a 2-1 (12-21, 21-19, 15-6) victory and advance to the quarterfinals, where they met third-seeded Miki Ishii and Sayaka Mizoe of Japan and produced a 2-1 (21-10, 13-21, 15-11) win to make it to their first semifinal on the Beach Pro Tour. With her five kill blocks, Worapeerachayakorn made the biggest difference in outpacing Ishii and Mizoe.

The first semifinal, between the Czechs and the Americans, on Tuesday morning starts at 09:00 local time (05:00 UTC). The second, between the Thais and the Chinese, is set to begin an hour later.

Dubai 1st Challenge: Schedule and results

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Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Dubai 1st Challenge
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