In Rome’s Foro Romanico, where the beach volleyball world championship is heading towards the finish line this weekend, Svenja Müller must feel like she’s in a shimmering dream. It’s her first World Cup ever, the blocker has only been playing on the World Tour since this season – and then suddenly she is the only one of five German teams left with her partner Cinja Tillmann. Müller, 21, and Tillmann, 30, were also hit hard by the heat, and the opponents didn’t make it easy for them either, just two examples: In the first knockout round they wrestled the Finns Lahti/Ahtiainen 2:1 in the third set (21:18, 20:22, 18:16), then in the quarterfinals the Australian Olympic silver medalists Taliqua Clancy/Mariafe Artacho Del Solar just as dramatically 2:1 (21:23, 21:18, 16:14).
The chances weren’t too bad of making it into the final against Canada’s Sophie Bukovec and Brandie Wilkerson at prime time on Saturday evening at 8 p.m. (who had previously knocked out German internationals Karla Borger and Julia Sude from the tournament). But then, after being 5-1 down in the third set, they lost their last bit of energy. They lost the semifinals with 15:21, 21:15 and 12:15 – one of their few misunderstandings sealed the defeat.
They still have a chance of a medal – on Sunday (4 p.m., in the live stream on sportdeutschland.tv) they will play against the Swiss Olympic bronze medalists Joana Heidrich and Anouk Vergé-Dépré for bronze. It would be the third-best German women’s result in the 25-year history of the World Cup – most recently Laura Ludwig and Kira Walkenhorst became world champions in Vienna in 2017, and Karla Borger and Britta Büthe had achieved silver in 2013.
After the weak performance of the only German male duo Nils Ehlers and Clemens Wickler (13th) and the other women around Borger and Julia Sude (9th), all hopes of the German Volleyball Association (DVV) rested on Müller and Tillmann, of all things . After all, they have only been playing together for a year and a half – both moved to the federal base in Hamburg on the advice of the DVV as a newly formed national team.
“We didn’t expect it to get so good so quickly,” says DVV sports director Niclas Hildebrand
Your perspective plan is actually clearly aimed at Paris 2024, and even more so at Los Angeles 2028. “We didn’t expect it to be so good so quickly,” said DVV sports director Niclas Hildebrand a few hours before the semi-finals the SZ. But the duo benefits enormously from each other, and finally, it seems, the gifted defender Tillmann, who has outstanding anticipation and athleticism, has found a partner with whom she harmonizes almost perfectly.
So far, Hildebrand says, she had “no clear blocker” at her side – but still won silver with Kim Behrens (who is now called van der Velde) without national team status at the 2020 European Championships in Latvia. Behrens and Tillmann also drew attention to themselves because they had been suing the association for years at that time. They complained that the DVV gave preference to its national teams when nominating for international tournaments, even though they were sometimes positioned worse than themselves in the world rankings. Ultimately, the beach volleyball players, who split up at the end of 2020, lost the process in which it was financial compensation in a five-digit amount had gone.
An ascent at insane speed
In terms of sport, Tillmann’s abilities remained undisputed for the association – and in Müller Tillmann, who “has a little more life experience and has also played more World Tour tournaments”, as Hildebrand says, now has a 1.92 meter tall blocker in front Netz, who hides her lack of experience in Rome in a pretty cool way.
“A clear blocker”: Svenja Müller (left) tries to prevent her Canadian opponent Brandie Wilkerson from scoring.
(Photo: Andrew Medichini / AP)
As early as the spring, there were indications that a new German women’s duo was making its way to the top of the world at crazy speed. They were ninth in Rosarito, fifth in Doha, fifth in Turkey, winners in Ostrava in a world series tournament of the highest category. As third in the world rankings, they had traveled to Rome, which must have seemed a little scary to them – also because of some partner changes in other teams, they had been flushed up the rankings.
Mental training is a key to success for Tillmann and Müller
But their success is well prepared. With the New Zealander Kirk Pitman and the trainer Helke Claassen, who is admired by many players and who is returning from her baby break, they have renowned coaches at their side – who also do a lot of mental coaching. Like the topic “F as in fears”, i.e. not showing any fears on the field and looking as little as possible at the score, but at yourself. Maybe that’s why Tillmann and Müller, neither of whom are extroverted players, were like that hardened in the many tight situations.
After this difficult World Cup for the Germans as a whole, the association is taking their excellent result, whether third or fourth place, with them to next week’s talks with the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB). It is an important date, according to Hildebrand, volleyball – hall and beach together – has so far received a small seven-figure amount annually for top sports personnel. Which isn’t too lavish for these two completely different sports.
“It’s not a one-hit wonder,” said Hildebrand on Saturday in the direction of Tillmann and Müller. They also seem more like a small band that is currently doing their first big world tour with verve and a lot of fun. Next stop: The European Championships in August on Munich’s Königsplatz.
