European Championships end on bittersweet note

In the Hague, this year’s European beach volleyball champions emerged after a surprise duo took the men’s title and two beach veterans said their goodbyes.

In the men’s competition, an unlikely duo rose from the reserve list all the way to the top of the podium. Only able to participate in the tournament due to last-minute withdrawals, the unlikely Latvian duo Plavins/Fokerots participated in their first European Championships as partners. Plavins, who is Fokerots’ senior by 20 years, is a three-time Olympian with a London 2012 Olympic bronze medal under his belt. Fokerots, despite his young age of 19, also has some impressive feats to show such as a U19 world title as well as U18 and U20 European titles.

The Latvians have been competing as a team for only a year and managed to beat Germany’s top men’s duo Ehlers/Wickler in an exhilarating three-set-match (17-21, 22-20, 15-5). This is the second silver medal on international level for the German duo in a row, as they also just landed an impressive second place at the Paris Olympics.

In the bronze medal match, Dutch home duo van de Velde/Immers beat the Italian fan favorites Cottafava/Nicolai after three sets (21-17, 17-21, 16-14). Both duos also just competed at the Paris Olympics, where they landed ninth place.

Two Austrian duos that landed ninth place at the European Championships are Hörl/Horst and interim-duo Hammarberg/Waller. The latter team formed just for this event, as Waller’s former partner Ermacora announced the end of his career earlier this summer.

Pablo Herrera, a six-time olympian and Athens 2004 silver Olympic medalist, played his final major international tournament in the Dutch city. The Spaniard, who ended up fifth at this year’s European Championships after losing the quarterfinals to Cottafava/Nicolai, previously claimed two European titles: one in 2005 with Raul Mesa and the other in 2013 with current long-time partner Adrian Gavira. In the more than 20 years of his career he has brought goosebumps to countless beach fans around the world, including Vienna, where he and Gavira last competed at the A1 Beach Pro in July.

Dutch home player Robert Meeuwsen also bid his farewell to competitive sport. He has been playing with Alexander Brouwer since 2011 – whether or not Brouwer will continue with a new partner or quit the sport as well is not yet clear. Though they have been a duo to watch out for early on, their triumph at the 2013 World Championships in Stare Jablonki catapulted them onto the main stage of the sport and they have had a quite successful career ever since, picking up a bronze medal at the 2016 Rio Olympics along the way. They have also been celebrated by many fans, not just on their home turf but internationally as well. In Vienna, they last gave us goosebumps at the 2023 European Championships.

Germany’s top women’s duo Müller/Tillmann found themselves on top of the podium once again, after just recently claiming the gold medal at the A1 Beach Pro Vienna. Eager to claim another medal, and fought a fierce match against Italians Gottardi/Menegatti, beating them in straight sets (17-21, 18-21). This is the first European Championship medal for Müller/Tilmann as a team, though Tillmann also claimed the silver medal in 2020 with former partner Kim Behrens.

The bronze medal went to Swiss power duo Esmée/Zoé, who showed no mercy against Lithuanians Paulikiene/Raupelyte and beat them in straight sets (20-22, 14-21). This is a step up for the Swiss women from last year, when they ranked a respectable fifth place at the European Championships in Vienna.

Austria’s top women’s duo Klinger/Klinger also stepped up from their results at last year’s tournament, where they finished 17th. After they had already achieved a career highlight at the Elite16 tournament in Vienna this July, they also finished on a top ten spot at the European Championships this year.