Sport preview: Beach Volleyball
A medal shake-up could be in store for the beach volleyball competition at the Samoa 2019 XVI Pacific Games, which will run over five days from Monday, 8 July at Apia Waterfront with free entry.
A number of new faces will feature in this year’s event, with several medalists from the Port Moresby 2015 XV Pacific Games not returning to defend their titles.
The men’s competition will feature 16 nations and the top three teams from each pool will go forward to a seeded, single elimination final series to determine who plays in the medal matches.
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The women’s competition will feature 11 nations and all teams will go forward to a seeded, single elimination final series to determine who plays in the medal matches.
Each day will feature a mixture of men’s and women’s matches. Monday’s action will tip off with men’s defending champions Papua New Guinea against Northern Mariana Islands followed by another seven men’s matches and three women’s matches, including defending women’s champions American Samoa.
However, Papua New Guinea’s gold medal winning men’s team from last time, Richard Kilarupa and Mea Moha, are not returning, while American Samoa have also brought a new women’s pair, leaving the competition wide open at Samoa 2019.
In the women’s event, Vanuatu will be eyeing gold, boosted by the presence of Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games bronze medalist Miller Pata, paired with Sherysyn Toko. They have been competing together on the international circuit for the past nine months.
Beach volleyball was first introduced to the Pacific Games in 1999, and this year is the sixth time it has been included in the programme.
A total of 18 countries have been confirmed to participate in beach volleyball, including Australia (invitational).
Beach volleyball will be broadcast on TV3 Samoa and Digicel PlayGo.
