Due to a lack of alternatives, the major beach volleyball event at Heumarkt will take place this week as a newly created Nations Cup with eight European countries per gender. Next year, the organizers plan to play once more on the Danube Island.
The duels of the national teams formed from two pairs should create an international atmosphere in the arena at Vienna’s Heumarkt. The Austrian women start once morest Italy on Tuesday. The men meet the Czech Republic on Wednesday. The game will initially be played in two pools of four, with the group winners going directly to the semi-finals. The second and third compete in the intermediate round, only the last are eliminated.
Men’s groups should survive group stage
It should be easy for Robin Seidl/Philipp Waller and Martin Ermacora/Moritz Pristauz to survive the group phase. The Netherlands are the strongest of their pool opponents. Like some other nations, the Czech Republic does not have its best line-up and Estonia is an outsider.
On Monday, Ronja Klinger was suffering from a gastrointestinal infection in the women’s team. Irrespective of this, Sister Dorina Klinger expects a “cauldron”. This might get particularly hot from Wednesday due to the expected heat wave.
Planned return to Danube Island
With 2,800 spectators, the arena at Heumarkt has a capacity of 600 more than in the previous year, as the arrangement of the stands was changed. As practiced for the first time in 2021, it is unusual for local beach fans to pay admission once more. There are separate tickets for the day and evening sessions. Especially in the evenings, tickets are already getting scarce. At the earlier major tournaments in much larger stadiums on Vienna’s Danube Island (2017-2019) and many years before that in Klagenfurt, there was almost always free entry.
That and the holding of tournaments of the FIVB Tour are history for the time being. Because organizer Hannes Jagerhofer does not take part in the ProTour, which has recently been centrally marketed by the world association FIVB. For this reason and because the European and World Championships had long been taken, the newly created Nations Cup was adopted without further ado. Next year, however, they want to switch back to the Danube Island on a larger scale, most likely with a renewed EM in classic mode.
With the Swiss European champions Tanja Hüberli/Nina Brunner and the Norwegians Anders Mol/Christian Sörum, the strongest couples do not play in the Austrian groups. Mol/Sörum have dominated events for a number of years, last year they won Olympic gold and then the European Championships in Vienna. This year she also became world champion for the first time.
