Olympic Beach Volleyball: Preliminary pools confirmed

Photo Gallery>>(BEIJING, July 27) -- Results of the drawing of lots for preliminary rounds of the Men's and Women's Olympic Beach Volleyball tournaments, which took place in Gstaad, Switzerland, were confirmed by FIVB on Saturday evening.

The drawing was held in the Menuhin Festival tent at the beautiful Swiss Alps resort, where two thousand beach volleyball fans, professional players, VIPs and local dignitaries witnessed the division of 24 men's teams and 24 women's teams into six groups of four that will make up each preliminary round of the Olympic tournaments in Beijing.

The preliminary stage of the Olympic Beach Volleyball competition will run from August 9 to 14, while single elimination matches (the so-called "knockout stage") that follow are scheduled from August 15 to 22.

The state-of-the-art, 12,000-seat venue in Chaoyang Park will play host to the fourth Olympic Beach Volleyball tournaments, with two "Lucky Loser" matches to be staged on a court adjacent to Centre Court.

The two top pairs in each pool, along with the two best third-placed teams, will advance to the single elimination stage of 16 teams. The remaining four third-placed teams will play two playoff matches to clinch the two final places (Lucky Losers) in the round of 16.

Under the supervision of FIVB executive vice-president Vicente Araujo and FIVB beach volleyball director Angelo Squeo and witnessed by relevant BOCOG officials, the drawing was completed by Swiss beach volleyball star Stefan Kobel and Swiss Paralympian Heinz Frei. The results are as follows:

Women's preliminary round pools:

Pool A

Tian/Wang, China (No. 1 seed)

Maaseide/Glesnes, Norway

Van Breedam/Mouha, Belgium

Montagnolli/Swoboda, Austria

Pool B

Walsh/May-Treanor, USA (No. 2 seed)

Hakedal/Torlen, Norway

Grasset/Peraza, Cuba

Saiki/Kusuhara, Japan

Pool C

Juliana/Larissa, Brazil (No. 3 seed)

Barnett/Cook, Australia

Uryadova/Shiryaeva, Russia

Saka/Rtvelo, Georgia

Pool D

Xue/Zhang, China (No. 4 seed)

Goller/Ludwig, Germany

Koutroumanidou/Tsiartsiani, Greece

Augoustides/Nel, South Africa

Pool E

Branagh/Youngs, USA (No. 5 seed)

Pohl/Rau, Germany

Ribalta/Crespo, Cuba

Kadijk/Mooren, Netherlands

Pool F

Talita/Renata, Brazil (No. 6 seed)

Karantasiou/Arvaniti, Greece

Schwaiger/Schwaiger, Austria

Candelas/Garcia, Mexico

Men's preliminary round pools:

Pool A

Xu/Wu, China (No. 1 seed)

Herrera/Mesa, Spain

Kais Kr./Vesik, Estonia

Gosch/Horst, Austria

Pool B

Rogers/Dalhausser, USA (No. 2 seed)

Heyer/Heuscher, Switzerland

Conde/Baracetti, Argentina

Samoilovs/Plavins, Latvia

Pool C

Santos/Rego, Brazil (No. 3 seed)

Schacht/Slack, Australia

Geor/Gia, Georgia

Fernandes/Morais, Angola

Pool D

Marcio Araujo/Fabio Luiz, Brazil (No. 4 seed)

Barsouk/Kolodinsky, Russia

Doppler/Gartmayer, Austria

Lione/Amore, Italy

Pool E

Nummerdor/Schuil, Netherlands (No. 5 seed)

Klempere/Koreng, Germany

Kjemperud/Skarlund, Norway

Laciga M./Schnider, Switzerland

Pool F

Brink/Dieckmann Ch., Germany (No. 6 seed)

Gibb/Rosenthal, USA

Boersma E./Ronnes, Netherlands

Asahi/Shiratori, Japan

Reigning Olympic men's and women's gold medalists Ricardo Santos/Emanuel Rego (Brazil) and Kerri Walsh/Misty May-Treanor (USA) will play in men's pool C and women's pool B, respectively.

A "serpentine system," together with the Olympic qualification ranking confirmed by FIVB on Thursday, July 24, was adopted in determining the exact final pool seeding results.

As No. 1 seeds, male players Linyin Xu/Penggen Wu and female players Jia Tian/Jie Wang of China were automatically placed in pool A in each tournament per FIVB regulations, with seeds No. 2 to 6 positioned in pools B to F.

FIVB and BOCOG officials will determine the preliminary round match schedule by Monday.