Even though she’s only 22, Eduarda ‘Duda’ Lisboa has had the Olympics on her radar for longer than she can remember. And in the next few months, she’ll finally be able to make her dream come true at the Tokyo Games.
The only daughter of a former Brazilian player, Maria Aparecida ‘Cida’ Lisboa, Duda has been a constant presence in beach volleyball events in her country during the last 15 years. Playing the sport was a natural path for her after she started following and watching her mother from a very young age and once her talent for the game became evident, expectations skyrocketed.
Duda first started hearing she would one day make it to the Olympics when she was 14 and her unparalleled success in FIVB age-group World Championships, which resulted in five titles and a gold medal at the 2014 Youth Olympics, only reinforced that feeling.
Her game translated perfectly to the elite level of the sport and now, after receiving the FIVB World Tour’s Most Outstanding Player award in 2018 and 2019, she’s just a few months away from living that long-awaited experience.
“Our team is doing a great job in focusing on one tournament at a time, but I can’t say I’m not anxious,” she told Volleyball World during the first of the three 4-star events held at the Cancun Hub. “It’s natural for someone who’s going to the Olympics for the first time, a lot of people have told me that. But I’m also trying to enjoy every step of the process because the truth is I don’t know if I’ll ever have that opportunity again, so I want to enjoy it as much as I can.”
Agatha and Duda are currently competing at the first event of the Cancun Hub in MexicoDuda and her partner Agatha Bednarczuk currently rank fourth in the provisional Olympic ranking but the team have already been selected by the Brazilian Federation to represent the country in Tokyo should Brazil have two berths at the end of the qualification period.
Despite Duda’s early start and successful career, going through an entire Olympic quad was something she had never experienced before, so having a silver medallist from the Rio 2016 Games by her side in the process was certainly a positive.
The two have had great success together too, having won 16 World Tour gold medals in the 34 events they have played since 2017, including golds in important tournaments like the World Tour Finals in 2018 and the Olympic test event in 2019.
But perhaps most important of all was the off-the-court growth that the experience provided Duda with.
“It was a big change for me,” she commented about joining Agatha four years ago. “I used to have three people in my coaching staff before, and with Agatha we went to 11 and everything became way more professional in a certain way. It required some adjustment for all of us, but I feel like I’ve grown so much from working with them. I knew it was a privilege having an Olympic medallist by my side right after she had been at the Games, and I did everything in my power to make the most of that opportunity.”
The Brazilians will certainly be among the contenders when the Games start in less than 100 days. Their most recent results, which include a bronze medal at the 4-star Katara Cup in Doha last month and a silver medal at the 2019 FIVB World Tour Finals in Rome, indicate they will be in a good position to fight for a podium placement in the Japanese capital.
But for Duda, there’s still more room and time for growth.
“We did a great job ever since we formed the team, and we got better every year,” the defender added. “I think now we understand each other better than we did before. But we’re still trying to improve and add something to our game. We’ll make some adjustments here based on what we saw in Doha and that will be the same for every event we get to play in. I think that physically and tactically we can still get better and we’ll use the next tournaments to accomplish that. We always dream big and will do whatever we need to do.”
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Go to:
Cancun Hub - 1st event
Cancun Hub - 1st event - Match schedule
Provisional Olympic ranking - Men
Provisional Olympic ranking - Women
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