Ranghieri/Carambula Frustrated After 0-2 Start in Vienna

2017 FIVB BEACH VOLLEYBALL WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS – VIENNA

• July 28 to August 6
• Vienna Centre Court, Vienna, Austria
• Co-ed
• Championships
• Event Site
• Schedule
• Facts & Figures
• Watch on YouTube

After losing their first two matches at the 2017 Beach Volleyball World Championships, Italian pair Alex Ranghieri and Adrian Carambula are 0-2, and haven’t yet won a set. That means that their match against Uruguay’s Vieyto/Cairus on Tuesday will be a play-in for which team goes to the lucky losers bracket, where they’d have to win again to advance to the 32-team elimination bracket, and which team is out of the tournament.

In a post-match interview after being swept by 2013 World Champions Brouwer/Meeuwsen on Saturday 21-16, 21-19, Carambula was audibly frustrated with his team’s performance this year. Last season, they finished the FIVB World Tour ranked 6th and had a combined $144,000 in earnings. That included two wins at the Antalya, Turkey and Doha, Qatar stops of the tour and had an overall 60-32 match won-loss record.. This season, they’ve been no better than 9th through their first 6 tournaments and have just a 9-15 match won-loss record in 7 matches. For a team that advanced to last year’s World Major Series finale in Toronto, the 2017 outcomes have not been a positive step.

In a post-match interview, which the FIVB had originally titled “A Team With Problems,” Carambula says that some of the problems “are personal,” and that injuries have interfered with their preparation and made it hard for them to get into a rhythm this season.