Porec, Croatia, July 3, 2018 - The Porec Open will be one of three FIVB World Tour events being staged this week as the international beach volleyball circuit returns to the Croatian resort town for the fourth-straight season starting Thursday with qualifying at Zelena Laguna Bay.
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A stadium of 600 seats will play host to four days of competition utilizing multiple competition courts. Main Draw slots for 16 men's and 16 women's teams are available, with a qualification being ran for the same number of pairs, all vying for a share of the 10,000 EUR total prize money pot.
Podium placers from previous FIVB World Tour events this season scheduled to compete in the Porec Open are Merve Nezir/Aleyna Vence of Turkey in the women's competition, and Simon Fruhbauer/Jorg Wutzl of Austria and Oleksii Denin/Denys Denysenko of the Ukraine.
Austrians Simon Fruhbauer (right) and Jorg Wutzl
Fruhbauer and Wutzl captured the gold medal on April 29 at the Langkawi Open in Malaysia after qualifying for the Main Draw. Deni and Denysenko placed third a month ago at the Alanya Open in Turkey. Two weeks ago, at the Manavgat Open in Turkey, Nezir and Vence claimed the bronze medal.
Vence Aleyna (left) and Nezir Merve of Turkey.
The Porec Open is the sixth of nine events incorporated from the European Volleyball Confederation (CEV) schedule into the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour for the 2017-2018 season. At the same time as the Porec Open is being staged, the CEV and FIVB will also be organizing the Anapa Open in Russia.
Turkey staged three of the first four events in Aydin (May 17-20), Alanya (May 31-June 3) and Manavgat, Turkey (June 21-24) with Austria hosting a tournament in Baden (June 14-17). Remaining CEV events being incorporated into the 2017-2018 FIVB World Tour schedule are Samsun, Turkey (July 26-29), Ljubljana, Slovenia (August 3-5), and Vaduz, Liechtenstein (August 8-12).