Next year’s European U20 beach volleyball championship is planned in the territory of “Merks”, in the area of Skanstes Street, reports the Latvian Volleyball Federation (LVF).
The master competition is planned from August 10 to 13. The 2023 championship will be held in the territory of “Merks”, where a new and permanent beach volleyball stadium will be created. The LVF states that the budget of the European U-20 Championship is approximately 250,000 euros and an intensive process of fundraising is currently underway.
Last summer, Latvian youth beach volleyball players had high-value achievements in international matches. Kristians Fokerots/Gustavs Auziņš won the U18 European gold and the U19 world gold, Dāvis Teteris/Oliver Bulgachs won the U19 world silver, Kristians Fokerots/Artūrs Rinkevičs won the U22 European silver, and Daniela Konstantinova/Līva Eber became the U20 European vice-champions. All of these medalists, except Rinkeviča, are old enough to qualify for next year’s European U20 Championship.
The last time a beach volleyball competition of this level took place in 2015, when the European U18 Championship took place in the capital of Latvia, where Tīna Graudiņa and Paula ņečiporukas won the women’s competition. The European Championship for adults was held in Jurmala in 2017 and 2020, and in 2018 – the European U22 Championship, in which Kristaps Šmits/Mikhail Samoilovs won the gold medals, while Graudiņa/Anastasia Samoilova (formerly Kravchenok) became the runners-up. Next year, the U18 championship will be held in the Spanish capital, Madrid, while the U22 championship will be held in the Romanian city of Timisoara.
