Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, August 8, 2016 - Alexander Brouwer and Robert Meeuwsen spent most of the third-and-deciding set here Monday evening chasing Markus Bockermann and Lars Fluggen in the Pool B Beach Volleyball match at the Rio 2016 Olympics Games. In the end, the team from The Netherlands caught and passed their German rivals with a three-point run to secure the victory.
With the 2-1 (21-19, 17-21, 16-14) win in 62 minutes over Bockermann and Fluggen, the 2013 FIVB world champions now lead Pool B with a 2-0 record after posting an opening victory Saturday over a team from Russia. Brouwer and Meeuwsen conclude group action Wednesday against Piotr Kantor and Bartosz Losiak of Poland.
In defeating Bockermann and Fluggen for the fourth-straight internationally after losing the first meeting between the two teams, the Dutch never led in the third-and-deciding set until tying the Germans at 14s and gaining the edge on a successful attack by Meeuwsen to force a timeout by Bockermann and Fluggen. Out of the timeout, Bockermann could not convert on an attack as he hit the ball into the net.
With the Germans now 0-2 in the pool after losing to Kantor and Losiak Saturday, Bockermann and Fluggen must defeat Dmitri Barsouk and Nikita Liamin of Russia Wednesday and hope for a better point ratio than their rivals. A Dutch win over Kantor and Losiak combined with a German victory over the Russian would force a three-way tie with a point ratio being used to determine the two teams advancing to the elimination rounds.
