USA Women Go 6-0; Doherty/Allen Among Men’s Pool Winners in Yangzhou

FIVB Yangzhou Four Star

• Oct. 9-14, 2018
• Yanzhou, China
• Schedule/Results

The American women went 6-0 in Day 1 of pool play at the Yangzhou Four Star. Something will have to give as main draw action continues on Thursday night as No. 2 seed Alix Klineman/April Ross will face qualifiers Betsi Flint/Emily Day in Pool B action.

Team USA boasts three of the top five teams in the tournament, including No. 3 Sara Hughes/Summer Ross and No. 5 Emily Stockman/Kelley Larsen.

Brazil did not fare as well on Day 1, going 2-4 with all four losses coming in tiebreak.

Top seeded Barbara Seixas de Freitas/Fernanda Alves won in tiebreak over China’s Bing Bai/Lvwen Yuan (19-21, 21-16, 15-11), while Ana Patricia Silva Ramos/Rebecca Cavalcanti Barbosa Silva won in straight sets (21-13, 21-11) over Latvia’s Anastasija Kravcenoka/Tina Graudina.

Angela Lavelle/Carol Horta fell to Hughes/Ross (21-19, 18-21, 15-9), while Josi Alves/Lili Maestrini lost to Flint/Day (15-21, 23-21, 15-13). Taiana Silva Bigi/Victoria Lopes Pereira lost to Switzerland’s No. 6 Nina Betschart/Tanja Huberli (21-15, 14-21, 15-7), while Maria Clara/Elize Maia fell to China’s Fan Wang/Chen Xue despite winning the first set (19-21, 21-17, 15-10).

No. 4 seed Sarah Pavan/Melissa Humana-Paredes also won, topping Ukraine’s Davidova/Shchypkova 21-19, 21-19.

In men’s action, top seeded Ahmed Tijan/Cherif Younousse (Qatar) dropped the opening match of the main draw, falling to Ukraine’s Sergiy Popov/Iaroslav Gordieiev in straight sets (21-17, 21-16)

Americans Ryan Doherty/Billy Allen are 2-0 in Pool A, sweeping Italy’s Caminati/Rossi (21-17, 21-16) and winning via forfeit over Popov/Gordieiev.

Stafford Slick/Casey Patterson split their day one meetings, topping Serbia’s Stefan Basta/Lazar Kolaric in tiebreak (20-22, 21-16, 15-12) and falling to Brazil’s No. 2 seed Pedro Solberg/Bruno Schmidt (21-14, 24-26, 15-12). Solberg/Schmidt lead the pool at 2-0.

Bill Kolinske/Miles Evans dropped their main draw opener to China’s Peng Gao/Likejiang Ha after winning the first set (18-21, 21-19, 15-10).

Other pool winners were:

• Pool C: #19 Philipp Arne Bergmann/Yannick Harms (Germany)
• Pool D: #4 Viacheslav Krasilnikov/Oleg Stoyanovskiy (Russia)
• Pool E: #5 Konstantin Semenov/Ilya Leshukov (Russia)
• Pool F: #11 Sam Pedlow/Sam Schachter (Canada)
• Pool G: #10 Gustavo ‘Guto’ Carvalhaes/Saymon Barbosa (Brazil)
• Pool H: #9 Ondrej Perusic/David Schweiner (Czech Republic)

Guto/Saymon topped countrymen #7 Alison Cerutti/Andre Loyola Stein in their second match (21-15, 21-14).