Amsterdam, the Netherlands, June 29, 2015 – Julia Sude and Chantal Laboureur caused an upset on Monday as they defeated seventh seeds Juliana Felisberta and Maria Antonelli to take top spot in women’s Pool G at the Netherlands 2015, FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships.
The German 18th seeds fought back from losing the opening set to beat the Brazilians 2-1 (17-21, 21-19, 15-13), a result which means they will stay in Amsterdam for the knockout rounds.
“We are very happy because they were topped seeded in our pool,” Sude said. “We remembered the last time we played them in Porec (Croatia) when we also beat them in a very close game. Our goal was to stay here in Amsterdam, so we’ve topped our pool and can stay here.”
“We tried to be strong and make the big hits,” Laboureur said. “Maybe we were a bit lucky in the end, but we are very, very happy we won this game, it was a very close game.”
Russia’s Konstantin Semenov and Viacheslav Krasilnikov set up a winner takes all clash against the USA’s Nick Lucena and Theo Brunner in men’s Pool J after both won their second matches.
Semenov and Krasilnikov beat Kazakhstan’s Dmitriy Yakovlev and Alexey Kuleshov 2-0 (21-17, 21-14) after opening with a win against Dutch pair Sven Vismans and Wessel Keemink.
Packed stadium
“Our two matches have been very difficult, against the hosts and then in the second match we made a bad start, but afterwards we changed our tactics and improved,” Semenov said.
“They (Lucena and Brunner) are a very good team and I can see them winning today, then we have to go and try and get a good result.”
Lucena and Brunner matched the effort of their Russian rivals immediately afterwards when they ignored the roar of the packed arena and defeated Vismans and Keemink 2-0 (21-16, 21-13).
The duo are going into the World Championships in good form having won bronze at the St Petersburg Grand Slam.
“It was fun,” Lucena said. “I thought we played well, really well. They’re a good team and we had to go up another level from the first match and that crowd can be heard across the whole country, but I love that kind of stuff.”
“It is going be a tough match,” Brunner added. “We’ve been studying them and they’ve been good to watch, so it’s going to be an awesome match.”
Karla Borger and Britta Buthe recovered from losing their opening match to USA’s Lauren Fendrick and Brooke Sweat by beating Russia’s Ekaterina Syrtseva and Maria Prokopeva 2-0 (21-16, 21-16).
The win means the 2013 silver medallists will have to beat the second Russian pair Evgenia Ukolova and Ekaterina Birlova, who have won both their matches so far if they want to top their pool.
“It was a great game and we didn’t drop our heads and lose heart,” Borger said. “We felt a little pressure on us, but you could see that we will keep on fighting to the end.
“We don’t want to put any pressure on ourselves as we know that there are a lot of good teams. You need to take it point by point. We know we can play really well and we’ve had some good tournaments. So long as we do our best we know we can have a good tournament.”