Qatar’s Cherif Younousse & Ahmed Tijan and Norway’s Anders Mol & Christian Sorum completed their matches of the first stage at the 2023 Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Finals in Doha, suffering no damages along the way, and topped their final pool standings to advance directly to Saturday’s semifinals.

· Watch the Beach Pro Tour Doha Finals live on VBTV.

After winning both their Pool B matches on Wednesday in tie-breaker sets, on Thursday, the reigning Olympic champions and world’s number one team produced two straight-set sweeps. First, the Beachvolley Vikings hammered out a shutout of the Swedish jump-setters, the world’s number two team David Ahman & Jonatan Hellvig, with Sorum leading the way with 22 points. Then, the Norwegians managed a victory over Italy’s Adrian Carambula & Alex Ranghieri to win the pool unbeaten.

Brazil’s Andre Stein & George Wanderley also achieved two straight-set victories on Thursday: over Carambula & Ranghieri and over Germany’s Clemens Wickler & Nils Ehlers, and climbed to second place on a 2-1 win-loss record, surpassing Ahman & Hellvig on set ratio. Regardless, both the Brazilians and the Swedes will pay in Friday evening’s quarterfinals, but will meet each other earlier in the day to distribute the second and the third places in the pool in a direct duel. Meanwhile, both the Germans and the Italians are out of contention for the playoffs on a 0-3 win-loss record each, before they face each other in search of their first victory in Doha.

In Pool A, Cherif & Ahmed started the day with a hard-fought comeback against reigning world champions Ondrej Perusic & David Schweiner of Czechia, despite Schweiner’s impressive nine kill blocks. Cherif reacted with six stuffs, while Ahmed led his team with 21 points, all in attack. Later on, the home team, Tokyo 2020 Olympic bronze medallists, mounted yet another comeback from a set down, their third of the tournament: against USA’s Miles Partain & Andrew Benesh. This time the blocking race was between Benesh, who put away as many as 12 stuffs towards a 30-point match high, and Cherif, who raised seven kill blocks towards a 29-point tally.

The Qataris topped the table on 4-0 to progress to the semifinals and will watch from the stands as the others battle it out for the two quarterfinal spots from the pool on Friday. Poland’s Bartosz Losiak & Michal Bryl also achieved two wins on Thursday, over Partain & Benesh and over Italy’s Paolo Nicolai & Samuele Cottafava, and climbed to second place in the pool on 2-1 before their last pool match against Perusic & Schweiner (currently fourth on 1-2) on Friday. Meanwhile, the Italians (third on 1-2) will take on the Americans (fifth on 0-3), as all four teams have their shots at making the quarterfinals.

VW Beach Pro Tour Doha Finals: schedule and results

Quick links:
Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour 2023
VBTV
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
YouTube
Subscribe to Volleyball World's Newsletter