Maybe you thought Anders Mol and Christian Sorum couldn’t have possibly gotten any better. This is a reasonable thought. The young Norwegians’ run these past three years has been one without precedent in beach volleyball.
So maybe you thought they had hit their peak.
How can they possibly come back stronger, better, an evolved version of themselves, after a pandemic and a hip injury to Mol?
Impossible is nothing to these Norwegians. It is nothing at all.
Mol, looking as healthy as ever, deployed the newest, most dangerous weapon in the sport: a missile of a jump serve. Just like that, with a single wrinkle added, the most difficult team to score a point against became exceptionally more difficult to score against.
And you thought the 2019 version of these Vikings was indomitable.
In Cancun, they put on quite the welcome back party. After Mol skipped Doha to recover from his hip injury, he and Sorum won every match they played. They lost just two sets in the process, despite the wind, despite the competition, in which they met one of the all-time greats, Phil Dalhausser, in the ninth-place round. They met the Doha silver medallist, Guto, in the quarters, and the Doha gold medallists, Ondrej Perusic and David Schweiner, in the semis.
It just didn’t matter.
It didn’t matter who was in their way, or what their opponents added to their arsenal over the extended 2020 off-season. Mol and Sorum remain the kings, the rulers of this beach volleyball world, proving so once more, beating Qatar's Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan in the finals, 21-19, 22-20.
“It’s just amazing to play this tournament and to win against such strong teams,” Sorum said. “To be on top of the podium again is amazing.”
And to be on the podium again is equally as amazing for Perusic and Schweiner.
David Schweiner/Ondrej Perusic, CzechCzech Republic, Qatar stay hot
Perusic and Schweiner have been one of the most intriguing surprises of the 2021 season thus far. Prior to the Doha 4-star a month ago, they had medalled in only one event above a 3-star. And then in Doha they looked near unbeatable, losing just a single set en route to their first gold medal as a team. A few weeks later, in Cancun, they captured their second consecutive medal, making this one a bronze.
It’s a bronze they can be mighty proud of as well, as they were sent to the bronze medal match by Mol and Sorum, taking one of just two sets the Norwegians dropped all weekend.
“It helps a lot,” Schweiner said of the bronze. “We knew before the start of this season we would have to play well to qualify for the Olympics.”
Perusic and Schweiner are not the only ones in that position. Cherif and Ahmed were in a similar scenario prior to 2021, ranked No. 14 in the Olympic race, hanging on by a few hundred points. In Doha, they finished fifth, their only loss coming to the Czechs. In Cancun, they captured silver, picking up another 720 points, improving upon their Olympic standing and, better yet, improving upon their consistency as a team.
They knocked off an impressive roster of teams in getting to the finals, including Theo Brunner and Chaim Schalk, World Champs Oleg Stoyanovskiy and Viacheslav Krasilnikov, Italians Adrian Carambula and Enrico Rossi, and Austrians Martin Ermacora and Moritz Pristauz.
Speaking of those Austrians…
Austrians Martin Ermacora and Moritz Pristauz take a huge leap
Are Ermacora and Pristauz a legitimate contender to make this Olympic Games? Maybe. Maybe not. Their 2019 season can almost be viewed as an investment period, building points, maybe contending, maybe not.
And then, in Qinzhou in October of 2019, breakthrough.
A silver medal, in which their only loss was in the gold medal match to Swiss Adrian Heidrich and Mirco Gerson, preceded a fifth at the Chetumal 4-star.
Momentum often begets momentum in this sport, and the Austrians pushed it further in Mexico once more, escaping a nailbiter of a qualifier match against Spaniards Alejandro Huerta and Cesar Menendez, 22-24, 21-18, 15-11 to make main draw in Cancun.
Then they upset Perusic and Schweiner, and claimed their pool – and a valuable first-round bye – by beating Carambula and Rossi, who finished with a phenomenal tournament in their own right.
A third-set comeback in the quarterfinals against Latvians Aleksandrs Samoilovs and Janis Smedins, in which they went down 7-11, set them up for an opportunity to compete for their second medal as a team. That would be for bronze, in a rematch against the very Czech team against whom they opened pool play.
They wouldn’t win the bronze medal. But getting that far was an enormous victory in and of itself. Getting fourth is a 560-point boost for the Austrians, huge both for their Olympic standing and for entry points to be seeded directly in the main draw in the final two events of the qualification period and beyond.
One of the biggest matches in regards to Olympic implications, however, occurred far before anyone was competing for medals.
Yves Haussener/Quentin Métral, SwitzerlandSwiss men winning… for other Swiss men
That match was contended on Friday night, while most every athlete in the main draw was readying for sleep. Yet there were Canadians Sam Schachter and Sam Pedlow and Swiss youngsters Yves Haussener and Quentin Metral, battling deep into a windy Cancun night. Though Haussener and Metral are no contenders in this Olympic race, their fellow countrymen, Heidrich and Gerson, very much are. It was only in Doha that the latter Swiss took over Schachter and Pedlow’s Olympic spot, the final berth via the Provisional Olympic Rankings. A win from Haussener and Metral in the qualifier would be a devastating blow to the Canadians, and a momentous win for the entire Swiss federation.
The devastating blow was dealt, the momentous win had. Haussener and Metral, who recently won a silver medal at the Doha 1-star in February, upset the Canadians, 17-21, 22-20, 16-14, keeping them out of main draw and, by extension, providing a win both for them and for Heidrich and Gerson.
And then Metral and Haussener did it again, beating Jake Gibb and Taylor Crabb in pool play – then again, stunning Nikita Liamin and Taras Myskiv to win pool. Yet for all the success of Metral and Haussener, despite the gigantic gift they handed to Heidrich and Gerson, it was a gift that would not be used.
Heidrich and Gerson fell to Liamin and Myskiv, then again to Gibb and Crabb, failing to break pool and take advantage of the absence of Pedlow and Schachter.
But this will be a long bubble in Cancun. Two tournaments remain to take advantage of upsets and weird matches.
Two tournaments remain in Mexico to climb the Olympic ladder.
Go to:
Cancun Hub - 1st event
Cancun Hub - 2nd event
Cancun Hub - 3rd event
Quick links:
FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour
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