Donlin and Denaburg Drop Another Stunner in Rio
USA’s Julia Donlin and Lexy Denaburg delivered another big upset at the Rio de Janeiro Elite on the Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour. After surprising the number two team in the FIVB World Ranking, Brazil’s Carol Solberg and Rebecca Cavalcanti, on Thursday, they went on to top their pool after another three-set stunner against the world’s number three team Tina Graudina and Anastasija Samoilova of Latvia on Friday.
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In the Pool B final, 14th-seeded Donlin and Denaburg celebrated a 2-1 (21-17, 11-21, 15-13) victory over third-seeded Tina and Anastasija to book a direct ticket to Saturday’s round of 12, where they are going to take on French Olympians Clemence Vieira and Aline Chamereau.
Both Tina and Anastasija and Carol and Rebecca managed to bounce back and also found their way into the round of 12. The Latvians put together a 2-0 (21-18, 21-16) sweep of their round-of-18 game against Paraguayan Olympians Giuliana Poletti Corrales and Michelle Valiente and will meet last week’s Joao Pessoa Elite winners Kelly Cheng and Molly Shaw of USA, who topped Pool D after a 2-1 (21-9, 12-21, 15-8) upset of fourth-seeded Italians Valentina Gottardi and Reka Orsi Toth.
The Brazilian pair first beat Katja Stam and Raisa Schoon of the Netherlands for the third place in their pool and then came back from a set down to claim a hard-fought 2-1 (16-21, 21-14, 15-10) round-of-18 win over American qualifiers Corinne Quiggle and Chloe Loreen. Their next opponents, Joao Pessoa silver medalists Terese Cannon and Megan Kraft of USA, also topped their Pool E after a 2-1 (15-21, 23-21, 18-16) upset of fifth-seeded Germans Svenja Muller and Cinja Tillmann.
The world’s number one team, top-seeded Brazilians Thamela Coradello and Victoria Lopes did not allow any surprises and won Pool A with a 2-0 (21-17, 21-19) shutout of Austria’s Dorina Klinger and Ronja Klinger. They will now be challenged by Muller and Tillmann, who recovered with a round-of-18 shutout of Brazilian qualifiers Andressa Cavalcanti and Taina Bigi.
Third-seeded Anouk Verge-Depre and Zoe Verge-Depre of Switzerland produced a 2-0 (21-17, 21-19) win over Vieira and Chamereau in the Pool C final and await Gottardi and Orsi Toth, who bounced back with a three-set comeback against Brazilian qualifiers Thainara Feitosa de Oliveira and Talita Simonetti.
Sixth-seeded Canadians Melissa Humana-Paredes and Brandie Wilkerson beat Quiggle and Loreen by 2-0 (21-19, 21-17) for the first place in Pool F and will next face the Klingers for a spot in the quarterfinals.
The round of 12 will serve off at 12:00 local time (15:00 UTC) on Saturday, to be followed by the quarterfinal round later in the day.
Photo credit: volleyballworld.com
