Women’s field reduced to 24 teams for single elimination at FIVB Paraná Open

Paraná, Argentina, October 30, 2014 — Emerging from two days and three rounds of round-robin pool play Thursday, 24 women’s teams have earned a spot in the single-elimination play that starts Friday at this week’s double-gender US$150,000 FIVB Paraná Open.

Back in Argentina for the sixth time it is the first time a FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour stop is being held in Paraná and will continue through Sunday in a purpose-built venue at Balneario Thompson.

Winning the eight pools with perfect 3-0 marks Thursday were three teams from Brazil, two from Canada and one each from Argentina, Czech Republic and Italy. The eight pool winners now receive a bye into the round of 16 eliminations while the second and third place teams in each of the eight, four team pools will meet in the first knouckout round Friday morning at Balneario Thompson.

On Friday’s women’s round of 24, round of 16 and quarterfinals will be played ending with the final two under the lights. The women’s semifinals and medal matches and awarding ceremony will all be held on Saturday. On Friday, the men will play their last of three pool play matches while on Saturday will be the start of their single-elimination with the round of 24, round of 16, and quarterfinals to set the stage for Sunday’s men’s semifinals medal matches, and awarding ceremony.

ELITE EIGHT POOL WINNERS
The elite eight undefeated teams coming out of pool play are Argentina’s top-seeded Ana Gallay/Georgina Klug, Brazil’s second-seeded Larissa Franca/Talita Antunes, Italy’s third-seeded Marta Menegatti/Viktoria Orsi Toth, Brazil’s fourth-seeded Maria Clara Salgado/Carolina Salgado, Canada’s sixth-seeded Jamie Lynn Broder/Kristina Valjas, Czech Republic’s ninth-seeded Barbora Hermannova/Martina Bonnerova, Canada’s 12th-seeded Kacie MacTavish/Caleigh Whitaker and Brazil’s 23rd-seeded Rebecca Cavalcanti/Liliane Maestrini.

CLOSE SECONDS
Ending with 2-1 records in their respective pools after losing to the pool winners on Thursday and now advancing to Friday’s round of 24 are USA’s fifth-seeded Lane Carico/Kimberly Dicello, who were upset by Canada’s lower-seeded MacTavish/Whitaker, Canada’s 13th-seeded Victoria Altomare/Julie Gordon who lost to Brazil’s fourth-seeded Salgado sisters and Italy’s 15th-seeded Giulia Momoli/Laura Giombini who were beaten by Brazil’s potent Larissa/Talita tandem.

ARGENTINIAN OLYMPIANS ROLLING ALONG
Playing refreshingly before a partisan, home country crowd as well as a legitimate contender for the gold medal on Saturday, Argentina’s Gallay/Klug are enjoying their home sand and on Thursday won the final pool play match in front of an adoring crowd in Parana. They completed their triple Thursday by defeating Canada’s 16th-seeded Claudia Seguin/Brandie Wilkerson in straight sets, 21-16, 21-16 in 36 minutes.

On Wednesday, Argentina’s Gallay/Klug started round-robin pool play with two wins by defeating Italy’s 32nd-seeded Laura Cavalluzzi/Jennifer Luca, 21-14, 211-3 in just 22 minutes then in their second crowd-pleaser, Argentina’s Gallay/Klug stopped Venezuela’s Olaya Perez/Norisbeth Agudo in straight sets, 21-13, 21-16 in 34 minutes.

Both Gallay and Klug are pleased to be playing an FIVB World Tour event in the home country and even more excited to have won their pool.

Following their second straight win of the day, both had comments to make.

Gallay commented, “We are at our physical limit, because we have played 25 tournaments this season. But we have had a dream since the Shanghai tournament in April when we started this season that we would get on the podium this year. We're playing well enough to achieve it here in Argentina if we don’t lose our concentration.”

Her Olympic teammate Klug said, “We have achieved three wins needed to finish on top in our pool. Tomorrow we rest in the morning and that is good to have the bye into the second round. We have added confidence with all the support of our fans and families who also dream with us especially for this tournament. We are excited to play in front of our fans, but we aren’t nervous about it. That has helped us not have too many mistakes in our first three matches.”

LARRISSA COMMENTS
With a 31-4 record since becoming a team late in this year’s FIVB World Tour including three consecutive gold medals, Brazil’s Larissa remarked following her team’s third win in Paraná to secure the pool for her and teammate Talita, “We are growing step-by-step. I know we have won some matches and three gold medals, but I also know how much we can and how much we need to improve to be at the level we need to be as we continue to get closer to the 2016 Rio Olympics. Talita is such a great player and the transition to a new teammate has been much easier and smoother than I ever expected.”

WOMEN’S TEAM ARGENTINA
As the host nation, Argentina has six men’s and five women’s teams in their respective main draws.

For the women, the main draw teams from Argentina ended their pool play with only 3-0 Olympians Gallay/Klug advancing to the elimination rounds as Maria Zonta/Julieta Puntin, Maria Sancer/ Florencia Amieva, Michella Di Cesare/Florencia DiCesare and Melina Churin/Cecilia Peralta all were eliminated with 0-3 records.

FIVB PURSE, TOURNEY TOTALS
The FIVB Paraná Open is the 312th FIVB men’s tournament since its first event in 1987 and the 276th FIVB women’s tournament since FIVB began women’s competitions in 1992. Gold medal winning teams in each gender in FIVB Paraná Open will split $11,000, silver will receive $8,000, bronze medalists get $6,000 and the fourth place finishers will earn $4,500 of the $150,000 total purse.