Ruslan Bykanov and Serguei Prokopiev have been receiving plenty of love from back home in Russia en route to the Doha Open semifinals, their best FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour finish of their careers so far.
On Friday they reached the quarterfinals by beating the USA’s Derek Olson and Stafford Slick 2-0 (21-12, 21-13). They then made it through to the semifinals with a 2-0 (21-13, 21-14) win against Peter Eglseer and Daniel Mullner.
“We can’t understand what we have done in this tournament,” Bykanov said. “It is the first time as a team and we are new partners.
“Everyone has been watching and supporting us on the internet because they can’t be here to cheer for us in Qatar.”
The pair are playing in their first tournament together as a team after their coaches decided to try them out ahead of the 2015 season.
It has proved tricky at times for the St Petersburg native Bykanov and Prokopiev, who lives in Moscow. However, they have overcome their lack of practice together to put in an impressive run in Doha.
“We haven’t trained much for this tournament,” Bykanov said. “In fact we have trained apart in our home towns because the season had finished.
“We can’t get our heads around what we have done, but we are playing well together and delighted with how we are playing, especially here in Doha because it is cold back home in Russia.”
German young guns continue dream run
Tim Holler and Jonas Schroder kept up their impressive run at their first World Tour event to join Bykanov and Prokopiev in the semifinals.
First the Germans defeated Poland’s Maciej Kosiak and Michal Bryl 2-0 (23-21, 21-17) and then followed up with another 2-0 (22-20, 21-14) win, this time against Yannick Salvetti and Jean-Baptiste Daguerre of France.
“It is our first main draw on the World Tour and we are so happy with the results because we know the French guys play pretty well in the wind,” Holler said. “We had our chance in the first set and the second set was better.
“We played them in Antalya in Turkey and it was pretty windy and they knew how to play the ball. We knew it would be a tough game, but we managed it well and won.”
The pair won their World Universities Beach Volleyball World Championships earlier in the year and have now made their mark on the World Tour in only their second Tour event.
“Our plan didn’t go as far as the semifinal,” Schroder said. “We just thought about one match after the other. We had a really good day today and very, very happy to be in the semifinals.”
Doha is making its debut as a World Tour venue. Previously it hosted beach volleyball as part of the Doha 2006 Asian Games. The World Tour is made up of 10 Grand Slam tournaments and eight Opens. The next and final tournament on the 2014 World Tour is the Mangaung Open in South Africa that runs from December 9-14.
To stay up to date with all the news and scores at the maiden Doha Open, click here