Doha: A total of 25 teams from 14 countries will be in the field at the FIVB World Tour's Doha Beach Volleyball Cup getting under way today at the Al Gharrafa Beach Complex.
The event kicks off with four pairs advancing to the main draw from the qualification rounds.
Qatar is hosting an FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour event for the eighth time and the Doha Beach Volleyball Cup is a 1-star men’s-only tournament. Doha will also host a 4-star men’s and women’s event from March 8-12.
Following today's qualifiers, the 16-team main draw for the Doha Beach Volleyball Cup begins with pool play tomorrow. The top three finishers in each of the four groups will advance to the elimination bracket where two rounds will be played on Thursday.
Friday’s schedule features the semi-final and medal matches.
Qatar's Cherif Younousse trains ahead of the Doha Beach Volleyball Cup at Al Gharafa Beach yesterday.
Eleven of the teams in the Doha Beach Volleyball Cup are ranked on the FIVB World Tour list led by Qatar’s Cherif Younousse Samba and Ahmed Tijan. With three World Tour medals to their credit in 29 FIVB starts together, Cherif and Ahmed are ranked 13th internationally.
Six other teams in the Doha Beach Volleyball Cup field have FIVB medals to their credit, including Anton Kislytsyn/Daniil Kuvichka and Alexey Gusev/Pavel Shustrov of Russia, Yves Haussener/Quentin Metral of Switzerland, Murat Giginoglu/Volkan Gogtepe and Selcuk Sekerci/Sefa Urlu of Turkey and Travis Mewhirter/Adam Roberts of the United States.
Also competing in the Doha Beach Volleyball Cup are Jackson Henriquez and Jesus Villafañe of Venezuela, who competed in one World Tour event together since their last full season on the international circuit in 2016.
Henriquez and Villafañe will start play in the qualifier on Tuesday as all five FIVB confederations are scheduled to have teams competing in the event - Asia (Lebanon, Oman, Qatar), Africa (Gambia, Egypt, Morocco), Europe (Poland, Russia, Switzerland), NORCECA (Canada and the United States) and South America (Venezuela).
The last World Tour event was played this past September in Lithuania where teams from Estonia (Kusti Nolvak Mart Tiisaar) and Italy (Margherita Bianchin/Claudia Scampoli) topped the men’s and women’s podiums, respectively.
