Sunday was Finals Day at the SCD Junior Beach Volleyball Finals in Portobello.
The Women’s Quarter Finals took centre stage in the morning with England overcoming Andorra and 3 Scottish teams qualifying for the Semi Finals after great matches.
The Men’s Semi Finals were Country vs Country with Andorra’s Verdu/Orteu coming up against their counterparts Suarez/Ayma. In an extremely tight match, the Andorra #1 side established a string lead in both sets and managed to hold their country men off to take the win 2-0.
The Scotland vs Scotland match between Hook/Ritchie and Glass/McKelvey was another tight match but Glass/McKelvey managed to halt the talents of their opposition by running a very smart strategy.
In the Womens Semi Finals, Englands Schoeffel/Tucker took on Scotlands Hamilton/Ross for the right to compete in the final. The English side were very consistent and displayed a fantastic level of International Beach Volleyball and made life very tough for the Scottish team. The Scots couldnt contain the English and lost out 2-0 and moved into the Bronze Medal match.
In the other Semi Final Hall/Donaldson put up a great fight against the Scotland #1 pairing of Waldie/Ramage. After taking the #1 seeds close in Set 1, they were unable to maintain this through the rest of set 2. This was a great showing by the young Scotland girls who have a fantastic future on the beach.
In the Men’s Bronze Medal match, Hook/Ritchie took an early lead in both sets but faced tough oppositon from Andorra but the Scots had what it took to take the match 2-0 and the bronze medal.
The Womens Bronze Medal match was between Hamilton/Ross and Hall/Donaldson. Both teams competed extremely well and played some very tight and tidy play in the torrential rain conditions. With both teams fighting to the end, it was Ayrshire’s Heather Hamilton and Kirsty Ross who took the Bronze Medal.
The Men’s Final was a very explosive affair between Andorras Verdu/Orteu and Scotlands Glass/McKelvey. The Andorran side were point for point with the Scots but a change in attitude from Andorra meant they were determined to make every contact count and pile the pressure on the Scots. Andorra took a good lead and closed out the set. The Scottish team regrouped in Set 2 and started to frustrate their opposition with great defence and transition play. This led to them gaining a little lead but managing to hold onto this until the end of the set to take the match to a decider. The Scottish guys got off to a strong start and put themselves within touching distance of taking the Gold Medal, but a couple of errors let the Andorrans back into the match in which they took full advantage by taking a tight 3rd set 15-13 and the title of the inaugural SCD Junior Beach Volleyball champions.
The Women’s Final was a battle of the Auld Enemy. Scotland put pressure on their English counterparts from the start but the English team were able to cope with what the Scottish team had to throw at them. Two very experienced sides out everything on the line to win the right to call themselves SCD champions but the experience and sand time the English have in their belts helped take the match 2-0 and take the title.
The first ever SCD Junior Beach Volleyball Championships was a huge success. It was a pleasure to see so many teams performing fantasticlaly for their countries and promoting the sport to the best of their abilities. The fact that over 10,000 people watched over the course of the weekend was a testament to the work of Scottish Volleyball’s SVA Staff and Beach Commissions collaboration to put on this event.
CEV Small Countries Association 