Porec, Croatia, June 30, 2017 - Led by two tandems from Beach Volleyball power Brazil, eight teams from seven countries captured men’s pool title here Friday at the $600,000 Porec Major as the FIVB World Tour returns to the Croatian seaside resort for the third-straight season.
Headlining the Brazilian winners are fourth-seeded Evandro Goncalves/Andre Loyola and ninth-seeded Pedro Solberg/Gustavo "Guto" Carvalhaes as the two teams topped Pool D and Pool G, respectively. While Evandro and Loyola have only played three matches this week so far, Guto and Solberg have been playing since Monday as the pair had to win country quota and qualifying matches to gain a spot in the 32-team Main Draw.
Alexander Brouwer and Robert Meeuwsen of the Netherlands, who captured the gold medal at the inaugural Porec Major in 2015, also won a group title (Pool F) while 2016 Croatian winners and fifth-seeded Alison Cerutti and Bruno Oscar Schmidt finished second in Pool E.
In a rematch of the gold medal match at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, 12th-seeded Daniele Lupo and Paolo Nicolai of Italy avenged their setback to Alison and Bruno in the Copacabana finale by defeating the Brazilians 2-0 (21-14, 21-18) in a 37-minute Pool E match. Alison and Bruno, who now have a 6-4 series lead with Lupo and Nicolai, had won the last five matches with the Italians with Friday’s contest snapping a five-match win streak for the Brazilian.
Other group winners Friday were 10th-seeded Adrian Gavira/Pablo Herrera of Spain, 16th-seeded Theo Brunner/Casey Patterson of the United States, 18th-seeded Clemens Doppler/Alexander Horst of Austria and 19th-seeded Sam Pedlow/Sam Schachter of Canada.
Eight other teams from Austria, Brazil, Norway, Latvia, Mexico, Poland, Russia, the United States also remain in the competition after winning first-round elimination matches Friday.