Qatar’s Cherif and Ahmed drawn with USA, Italy and Switzerland for Tokyo Olympics beach volleyball

Tribune News Network Doha Qatar’s leading beach volleyball pair of Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan will be leading Pool C being drawn alongside USA, Italy...

Tribune News NetworkDohaQatar’s leading beach volleyball pair of Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan will be leading Pool C being drawn alongside USA, Italy and Switzerland for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games to be held later this month.The drawing of lots ceremony for the beach volleyball tournament at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 was completed in Moscow on Monday with 24 men’s and 24 women’s teams scheduled to participate in the event in the Japanese capital starting on July 24. The teams learned who their pool play opponents will be in the first phase of the competition.The 24 teams per gender includes one team from the host country of the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 (Japan), the winners of the 2019 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships, the two winners of the Olympic Qualification Tournament, 15 teams from the Olympic Ranking and a further five from the Continental Cup Finals.Cherif and Ahmed had recently achieved second rank in the Olympic classification with a score of 7,720 points, behind only the rank one Norwegian team with 10,960 points. The other pairs in Pool C are: Gibb/Crabb Ta. (USA), Carambula/Rossi (ITA), Heidrich/Gerson (SUI)Men’s Olympic Ranking leaders Anders Mol and Christian Sorum of Norway were placed in Pool A and will take on Konstantin Semenov/Ilya Leshukov of ROC, Pablo Herrera/Adrian Gavira of Spain and Christopher McHugh/Damien Schumann of Australia. In the women’s competition, world champions Sarah Pavan and Melissa Humana-Paredes of Canada will take on Swiss pair Joana Heidrich/Anouk Verge-Depre, Germans Julia Sude/Karla Borger, and Katja Stam/Raisa Schoon of the Netherlands.The Beach Volleyball tournament at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 will be held at Shiokaze Park. The preliminaries will take place from July 24 to 31 and be followed by the elimination round matches from August 1 to 7. The women’s medal matches will be played on Friday, August 6 and the men’s on Saturday, August 7.Following are the six pools per gender:MenPool A - Mol A./Sorum C. (NOR), Semenov/Leshukov (ROC), Herrera/Gavira (ESP), McHugh/Schumann (AUS)Pool B - Krasilnikov/Stoyanovskiy (ROC), Perusic/Schweiner (CZE), Plavins/Tocs (LAT), Gaxiola/Rubio (MEX)Pool C - Cherif/Ahmed (QAT), Gibb/Crabb Ta. (USA), Carambula/Rossi (ITA), Heidrich/Gerson (SUI)Pool D - Alison/Alvaro Filho (BRA), Brouwer/Meeuwsen (NED), Lucena/Dalhausser (USA), Azaad/Capogrosso (ARG)Pool E - Fijalek/Bryl (POL), Evandro/Bruno Schmidt (BRA), Grimalt M./Grimalt E. (CHI), Elgraoui/Abicha (MAR)Pool F - Gottsu/Shiratori (JPN), Thole J./Wickler (GER), Nicolai/Lupo (ITA), Kantor/Losiak (POL)WomenPool A - Pavan/Melissa (CAN), Heidrich/Vergé-Dépré A.(SUI), Sude/Borger (GER), Stam/Schoon (NED)Pool B - Alix/April (USA), Keizer/Meppelink (NED), Liliana/Elsa (ESP), Xue/Wang X.X. (CHN)Pool C - Agatha/Duda (BRA), Bansley/Brandie (CAN), Wang/X.Y. Xia (CHN), Gallay/Pereyra (ARG)Pool D - Ana Patricia/Rebecca (BRA), Claes/Sponcil (USA), Kravcenoka/Graudina (LAT), Makokha/Khadambi (KEN)Pool E - Clancy/Artacho Del Solar (AUS), Makroguzova/Kholomina (ROC), Menegatti/Orsi Toth (ITA), Lidy/Leila (CUB)Pool F - Ishii/Murakami (JPN), Betschart/Hüberli (SUI), Kozuch/Ludwig (GER), Hermannova/Slukova (CZE)