PARIS, France, July 27, 2024.- The Cuban hopefuls deliver a dream start to the Olympic Games. Before this season, Noslen Diaz & Jorge Alayo’s best results came on the continental NORCECA Beach Volleyball Tour.
The young Cubans hardly ever appeared on the Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour, and although they did make some headlines with the unexpected fourth place at the Itapema Challenge in April 2023 and even more so with their Pan American Games silver in October 2023, they were far from being considered one of the big teams internationally.
The qualification process for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games had long started but come March 2024 Diaz & Alayo were barely in the top 30 of the FIVB World Ranking and nowhere near the qualification zone in the provisional Olympic Ranking, some two thousand points below the closest team that eventually qualified through the ranking. Yet here they are at the Games in Paris, shining in Saturday’s tournament opener at the Eiffel Tower Stadium, showing confidence in front of the thousands of cheering spectators on the stands and mastering a straight-set 2-0 (21-18, 21-18) victory over USA’s leading pair, Miles Partain & Andrew Benesh.
“We trained hard in Cuba before the start of the season and then we gave everything on the court to achieve qualification,” was 21-year-old Diaz’s simple explanation.
But what happened in between?
In late March, in Recife, the Cuban pair had their second go at an Elite16 tournament and not only qualified for the main draw for the first time at that level, but pushed forward all the way to the final to stun the world with a silver medal. It was even more stunning that just a week later, at the Saquarema Challenge, they claimed another silver. After finishing fourth at their next Beach Pro Tour appearance, at the Guadalajara Challenge, Alayo & Diaz continued their fantastic season with a bronze at the Tepic Elite16.
In the meantime, they kept competing at the NORCECA Tour and medalled at every single one of the three continental events they took part in this year, clearly driven by the idea to collect enough points and qualify for Paris. And so they did. In early June, the Cuban hopefuls took another silver at the Stare Jablonki Challenge, at which point they jumped over the cut-off line for the Games in the World Ranking, eventually snatching the second-from-the-bottom qualification spot, some 540 points above the red line.
And if anyone had thought that it was a mission accomplished, and there was no way Alayo & Diaz could continue maintaining this great shape into the Olympics, they were proven wrong in the Paris 2024 opener. Match favourites Partain & Benesh started better and opened a 16-11 lead in the first set. At that point, however, the Cuban duo went on an eight-point run, with some great serving from Diaz and some monster blocking from Alayo, took control of the scoreboard, never looked back and won the game in straight sets. They both showed speed, power and efficiency in attack to help them tackle the tough opponents.
“The preparation that we had from the beginning of the season was directed at keeping our physical power, mental strength and technical level through the end of the competition. But putting our hearts into the game is the most important part,” 23-year-old Alayo told FIVB after the game. “We are working point by point, game by game… We think through every step to keep the mind at ease and this is delivering good results for us so far. For me, my partner is everything! He is exceptional and I am very, very proud of what he always does and of the strength he goes into the court with.
“We started in Qatar at the Doha Elite16 in January and went on to the last Challenge event in Poland, where we secured the qualification. It wasn’t easy. We started ranked 33rd and finished ranked 17th, and here we are, winning our first game at the Olympics… It’s a big responsibility. It’s wonderful! It’s wonderful to play in this kind of setting, the biggest one I have ever played in. The fans are here and even in the rain the stadium is almost full, and that provides great extra motivation for us on the court. The first dream of every athlete is to be here, at the Olympics, and the second one is about being aware that you have given everything you’ve got to be satisfied with yourself.”
“We expected that there would be a great audience. It was pretty even between USA and Cuba. We came to the court to do our job and win the public’s hearts,” 2.07m-tall defender Diaz added.
Mighty Brazilians Andre Stein & George Wanderley, the current number three team in the FIVB World Ranking, are the next obstacle in Diaz & Alayo’s Olympic quest. They will hit the court on Tuesday, at 12:00 local time (10:00 UTC), and the Cubans are already looking forward to this challenge, while the Brazilians have yet to play their first-leg game in the pool against Morocco’s Mohammed Abicha & Zouheir Elgraoui later on Saturday.
“Now we are trying to keep our heads cold, analyze what happened today, and give everything we’ve got against Brazil,” 1.98m-tall blocker Alayo commented. “We always have good games against them since we first met at the Pan American Games.”
Indeed the two teams know each other well. They exchanged three-set victories at the Pan American Games, with George & Andre winning the second encounter in the gold medal match. Another three-setter with an epic tie-breaker against Diaz & Alayo gave the Brazilians the Saquarema Challenge gold in the final. Their next encounter in the Tepic Elite16 semifinals was also pushed to three sets and it was once again George & Andre who emerged victorious.
“Most importantly, we are going to enjoy every moment of the Games here, step by step, keeping in mind the effort we put in to get here,” concluded Diaz.
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