Hamburg, Germany, August 25, 2017 – Eight men’s teams remain alive in the race for the gold medal of the $800,000 Swatch Beach Volleyball FIVB World Tour Finals presented by Vodafone as the tournament moves to the quarterfinals round this Saturday in Hamburg.
With eight countries still in contention, one of the matchups will have special attention as second-seeded Evandro Goncalves and Andre Loyola of Brazil will face eighth-seeded Clemens Doppler and Alexander Horst of Austria in a rematch of the FIVB World Championships, which happened three weeks ago, when the Brazilians upset the Austrians in front of their home fans to take the gold in Vienna.
“It will be really interesting since we are only three weeks removed from that amazing match in Vienna,” Andre commented. “We know they will be motivated and will have the support of their fans, so it will be really tough. We just need to keep our focus, take it as just another game and fight for our spot in the semifinals.”
It will be the third meeting between the teams with the Brazilians having won the previous two – the first was in the Fort Lauderdale Major, in February. But it is the gold medal match in Vienna that remains on the players’ minds.
“We just have to make sure Evandro is not serving when we get our set points,” Doppler joked, recalling the Brazilian’s amazing performance in Vienna. “It will be a lot of fun. We’re obviously in a different tournament now, with way less pressure and I’m really looking forward to play the world champions again. The atmosphere is amazing here and I feel that helps us since we always want to have fun in the court and play easy.”
The other three quarterfinal matches in Hamburg will have top-seeded Phil Dalhausser/Nick Lucena of the United States vs. 12th-seeded Chaim Schalk/Ben Saxton of Canada, fifth-seeded Daniele Lupo/Paolo Nicolai of Italy vs. ninth-seeded Pablo Herrera/Adrián Gavira of Spain and sixth-seeded Piotr Kantor/Bartosz Losiak of Poland vs. fourth-seeded Markus Bockermann/Lorenz Schumann of Germany.
The semifinals, bronze and gold medal matches are scheduled for Sunday.
