Raisa Schoon and Katja Stam qualified for the Elite16 final in Paris. The Dutch beach volleyball duo was too strong for Americans Kelly Cheng and Betsy Flint in the semi-finals: 21-17, 21-17.

It was a success among men. Alexandre Breuer and Robert Mausen eliminated third place in the standings list, Italians Paolo Nicolai and Samuel Cotavava, in a real thriller in a real thriller: 27-25, 23-25, 15-9.

The medals will be distributed on Sunday from 2:00 pm.

Sean/Stam, the duo that won the Elite16 tournament in Mexico in March and briefly led the rankings this year, finished 10th on the sands of Roland Garros, the place where tennis players always play their second Grand Slam in May. and june. I finish the year.

The question was how the balance of power would be against number six on the ranking list, but Cheng/Flint looked at the disadvantage from the start of the match.

In fact, a similar duel ensued earlier in the day. The match went fairly evenly, but the Dutch did not give up their lead.

On the morning of the quarter-finals, Swiss pair Esmée Böbner and Zoé Vergé-Dépré were the contenders. Also in that match the score was 21-17, 21-17.

At Brouwer en Meeuwsen it was even more exciting all day long. That already started in the quarter-finals against Pablo Herrera and Adrian Gavira: 21-17, 15-21, 15-13.

They both bombarded each other in the third set with very strong blows and threw hard blocks in front of them. Brouwer/Meeuwsen narrowly led at the start of the third set, but the difference was never comfortable.

At 13-9 for the Dutch it looked like it was over, but the Spaniards made their way to 14-13 with one last attempt – leading to some annoyance between the two teams. It turned out to be a cramp finally.

After that, the Dutch waited a long time. It wasn’t until 10.15pm that it was their semi-final turn against Italians Nikolai and Kotavev, who had brought Stefan Bormans and Matthews Emers home earlier in the day.

Attendees are rewarded. It was a nerve-wracking match, as 52 points in the first set alone had to be used to determine the winner (Brewer/Musin): 27-25.

In the second act, the duo has remained evenly matched, this time with the third number in the list of positions charting the longest. But the Italian resistance was broken in the third set: 15-9 for Breuer and Muesen.

Shaun and Stam will play the final at 2 pm against the European champions from Latvia (Anastasia Samoilova and Tina Graudina), after which Breuer and Mjøsen will compete with the second-placed, Anders Berntsen Mull and Kristian Sandli Sorum, from 4 pm.