Leading the point standings in the 2012 FIVB Beach Volleyball Swatch World Tour, China’s Xue/Zhang will play in Saturday’s first match in the magnicificent purpose-built 15,000 stadium that rests in the shadow of legendary British Army commanders-in-chief memorial statues and the next door neighbor of No. 10 Downey Street, better known as the home of British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Launching the fifth Olympics that will feature beach volleyball as a medal sport, China’s Xue, 23 and Zhang, 27 will be a much more seasoned team than the youngsters who captured much of the Beijing spotlight with their stunning bronze medal victory. At 9 a.m. on Saturday, the first whistle will blow to herald the first serve to officially begin the beach volleyball competition of the XXX Olympiad, China’s Xue/Zhang, seeded second in this year’s Olympics, will meet Russia’s 23rd-seeded Anastasia Vasina/Anna Vozakova in the first of three pool play matches.

With three women’s events remaining on this FIVB SWATCH World Tour, China Xue/Zhang qualified for the Olympics through the Olympic rankings based on the world tour.  Russia’s Vasina/Vozakova earned their spot with a victory in the inaugural FIVB World Cup Olympic Qualification Tournament.

China’s Xue/Zhang have been preparing for four years for this event and to help that preparation they have played in 76 events on the FIVB SWATCH World Tour . In that run, they have earned a spot in the final four 41 teams, earning 12 gold medals, 12 silver, 11 bronze and six fourth place finishes.

The tandems in London have been split equally into six pools, playing each team in their group, with the top two advancing to the single-elimination knockout phase along with the two best third-placed teams. The remaining four third-place teams will then compete in playoff matches to determine which pairs will fill the final two places in the 16-team eliminaation bracket’s first round.

Following her team’s practice in the Horse Guards Parade complex, Xue said, “It is different this year because we are not a home team now. This means we don’t have the pressue of being at home for something as important as the Olympic Games. We are a lot more relaxed now than in Beijing. Horse Guards Parade is just perfect.  It’s totally different from last year (at the beach volleyball test event in August). This stadium is huge and the venue is just so beautiful and amazing.  We just want to play hard, have fun and do the best we can and if we do, we are confident we will be in the gold medal hunt.”

Sixteen teams have qualified for the Games through the Olympic Ranking which is based primarily on world tour standings, with five more joining as winners of the AVC, CAVB, CEV, CSV and NORCECA Continental Cup Finals and two from the World Cup Olympic Qualification Tournament. Great Britain has also been granted a berth as hosts.

The sold-out beach volleyball competition at the 2012 London Olympic Games will be held Saturday through Aug. 9 in a purpose-built 15,000-set stadium on the grounds of the iconic Horse Guards Parade in central London.

Following are the pool assignments for this year’s beach volleyball competition at the Olympic Games:

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2012 Olympic Games Beach Volleyball
MEN’s Pool Assignments
Seed, Team, Country
POOL A
Alison Cerutti/Emanuel Rego, Brazil
Jefferson Bellaguarda/Patrick Heuscher, Switzerland
Daniele Lupo/Paolo Nicolai, Italy
Clemens Doppler/Alexander Horst, Austria
POOL B
Phil Dalhausser/Todd Rogers, United States
Adrian Gavira Collado/Pablo Herrera, Spain
Petr Benes/Presysl Kubala, Czech Republic
Kentaro Asahi/Katsuhiro Shiratori, Japan
POOL C
Julius Brink/Jonas Reckermann, Germany
Penggen Wu/Linyin Xu, China
Sebastian Chevallier/Sascha Heyer, Switzerland
Serguei Prokopiev/Konstantin Semonov, Russia
POOL D
Jake Gibb/Sean Rosenthal, United States
Grzegorz Fijalek/Mariusz Prudel, Poland
Aleksandrs Samoilovs/Ruslans Sorokins, Latvia
Freedom Chiya/Grant Goldschmit, South Africa
POOL E
Reinder Nummerdor/Richard Schuil, Netherlands
Jonathan Erdmann/Kay Matysik, Germany
Martins Plavins/Janis Smedins, Latvia
Igor Hernandez/Jesus Villafane, Venezuela
POOL F
John Garcia-Thompson/Steven Grotowski, Great Britain
Pedro Cunha/Ricardo Santos, Brazil
Tarjei Skarlund/Martin Spinnangr, Norway
Josh Binstock/Martin Reader, Canada

2012 Olympic Games Beach Volleyball
WOMEN’s Pool Assignments
Seed, Team, Country
POOL A
Juliana Felisberta Silva/Larissa Franca, Brazil
Katrin Hloltwick/Ilka Semmler, Germany
Lenka Hajeckova/Hana Klapalova, Czech Republic
Natacha Rigobert/Elodie Li Yuk Lo, Mauritius
POOL B
Chen Xue/Xi Zhang, China
Simone Kuhn/Nadine Zumkehr, Switzerland
Vasiliki Arvaniti/Maria Tsiartsiani, Greece
Anastasia Vasina/Anna Vozakova, Russia