2015-06-11 10:50:00 CEST
Thursday Preview: Everybody into the pool
Day three at the Swatch Beach Volleyball Major Series stop in Stavanger is a day in the pool: group Pool play. Men dive into the start of these Main Draw matches, while by evening the women will know who will emerge from the pool and into Friday's Quarter Finals.
The sun is finding its way back to Stavanger, Norway, and the women's and men's teams will be in action on the drying sand across four courts at the Swatch Major Series on June 11, 2015. It's Pool time, where teams play multiple matches within assigned groups in the struggle to survive and go on to the Quarter Finals.
In men's action, the big guns will be looking to impose their dominance. In the morning, the Brazilian superstars Ricardo Santos and Emanuel Rego will be the focus of the grandstands (and the passengers of the cruise ship towering over the action), as they first go up against Australia in the wind-free, warm atmosphere created by Center Court – an environment Brazilian teams tend to thrive on. Then they'll have to switch gears and tough out the chill and breezes of the side courts as they take on a duo of determined Russians when evening falls.
Also jumping from Center Court to the side courts will be teams like Reinder Nummerdor and Christiaan Varenhorst of the Netherlands, who made it to the final four at the Poreč Major less than a week ago. Other favorites playing two matches today include the reigning World Champions and Poreč Major victors, Alexander Brouwer and Robert Meeuwsen, also of the Netherlands, as well as the Poreč silver medalists, Canada's Josh Binstock and Sam Schachter.
The women are fighting elbow-to-elbow to get through the door left open by the withdrawal of the Poreč Major gold medalists Larissa Franca and Talita Antunes, and Thursday's play will determine once and for all who will play when women's Quarter Finals kick off on Friday.
In Center Court at 4:00pm CET will be the sweethearts of Wednesday's action, the number 8 seed Norwegian women's team of Janne Kongshavn and Victoria Faye Kjølberg, who will make their last Pool play appearance in the tournament against the imposing duo of Liliana Fernandez Steiner and Elsa Baquerizo Macmillan of Brazil.
Photocredit: Samo Vidic/ Limex images
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