BEIJING // Women's champions Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh shook off the rain to sail through their first match of the beach volleyball event, while the Chinese men powered onto the sand to screaming crowds. The Americans May-Treanor and Walsh, who are seeking to become the first team to defend an Olympic beach volleyball title, beat the Japanese pair Chiaki Kusuhara and Mika Teru Saiki 21-12, 21-15 in 36 minutes.
The Japanese put the triple world champions through their paces, forcing long rallies that tested tactics from Walsh's towering blocks to May-Treanor's stinging spikes and serves. "It felt good out there, it was our first time on centre. But it's so humid it was kind of hard to get your breath back in long rallies," said May-Treanor, 31. The rain poured down during the first few matches today but it did nothing to dampen the spirits of the 10,000-strong crowd who donned yellow plastic ponchos to cheer on Wu Penggen and Xu Linyin, China's first men's Olympic beach volleyball team.
Wu and Xu made quick work of their first match, dispatching the Austrian pair Florian Gosch and Alexander Horst 21-16, 21-15. The pair are placed fifth in the Olympic qualifying rankings but are seeded first as the home team. Once the rain cleared, Brazil kept up the pressure on the rest of the pack with both their second-ranked men and women notching up their first wins while Cuba's top team fought past Norway and will now face the US champions.
*Reuters