In looking at the men's stats heading into Thursday's medal matches, Latvia's Martin Plavins is leading the individual categories of points and digs at Horse Guards Parade in the London 2012 Olympic Games

London, Great Britain, August 9, 2012 – In the quiet stillness on the sand-court floor as it prepares to host tonight’s men’s medal matches, the final four teams all are among the leaders in multiple statistical categories heading into their final performances on this ultimate stage as this year’s beach volleyball competition of the London 2012 Olympic Games concludes after 10 days of jousting action.

All the crowd-pleasing, heart-pounding action is being held in the purpose-built, sold-out 15,000-seat stadium on the grounds of the iconic Horse Guards Parade as the majestic venue includes a portion of adjacent St. James Park in historic central London.

The men‘s medal matches will be held Thursday night as the final curtain falls on the most celebratory beach volleyball competition in Olympic Games history. Impressive team and individual official statistics continue to reflect the depth and quality of the field here at Horse Guards Parade.

Meeting in the men’s bronze medal match 7 p.m. in the stadium at Horse Guards Parade will be Netherlands’ veteran fifth-seeded Reinder Nummerdor/Richard Schuil and Latvia’s surprising 17th-seeded Martins Plavins/Janis Smedins while the gold medal match at 9 p.m. will showcase Brazil’s top-seeded Alison Cerutti/Emanuel Rego jousting on the hallowed grounds against Germany’s third-seeded Julius Brink/Jonas Reckermann.

Again, through Tuesday’s Day 10 of this Olympic Games competition, of the 52 men’s matches held, 38 were two-set matches with eight seed breakthroughs with an average time of 39 minutes per match.  The 14 matches that have gone to the tie-break has seen five seed breakthroughs with an average time of 56 minutes.

As a team, Germany’s Brink/Reckermann lead one category and our third in another while individually, Reckermann and Brink are first and second in one category. In the team category, Germany’s Brink/Reckermann lead in aces with 22 and are third in blocks with 26. Reckermann is individual stats with first in aces with 12 while Brink is second with 10.

Brazil’s Alison/Emanuel, the favorite for the gold medal, lead one category as a team and are second in another ad individually they lead one category as well. As a team, the Brazilians lead in blocks with 35 and they are second in digs with 104 while Individually, Alison leads the tournament in blocks with 34.

Among the bronze medal teams, Netherlands’ Nummerdor/Schuil are tied for second in attack success percentage at 56%, and individually Nummerdor is tied for second in digs with 72.  For Latvia’s Plavins/Smedins, they lead in team digs with 119, Plavins is tops in points with 123 and he is also first in digs with 91.
 
In the other team stats category, Brazil’s seventh-seeded Pedro Cunha/Ricardo Santos, who finished fifth in this year’s Olympics, leads with a attack success percentage of 59%.

In the team stats categories, the other top leaders are: in aces, second is Germany’s eighth-seeded Jonathan Erdmann/Kay Matysik with 15 and third is USA’s second-seeded Phil Dalhausser/Todd Rogers with 12.

In total blocks by a team, Italy’s 13th-seeded Daniele Lupo/Paolo Nicolai is second with with 29.

In team attack success percentage, tied for second with Holland’s Nummerdor/Schuil at 56% is Lativia’s Aleksandrs Samoilovs/Ruslans Sorokins.

In team digs, third is USA’s fourth-seeded Jake Gibb/Sean Rosenthal, who also finished fifth with 95.

Individually, Russia’s Konstantin Semenov and USA’s Dalhausser are tied in attack success percentage with 66% and Dalhausser is tied for tied with Germany’s Matysik with nine total aces.

Leading the other individual catagory, the top athlete is Latvia’s Ruslans Sorokins (top serve speed, 99 km/h).

In points, Germany’s Erdmann is second with 121. In blocks, Italy’s Paollo Nicolai is second with 29.  Third in attack success percentage is Brazil’s Ricardo at 63%. In digs, tied for second is Russia’s Sergey Prokopyev with 72.

In some of the miscellaneous numbers, the longest men’s match through Tuesday was one hour, nine minutes whenSwitzerland’s Chevallier/Sascha Heyer defeated Russia’s Prokopyev/Semenov, 28-26, 18-21 and 15-13 on July 30. The shortest men’s match length has been 33 minutes when USA’s Jake Gibb/Sean Rosenthal defeated South Africa’s Freedom Chiya/Grant Goldschmidt, 21-10, 21-11 on July 28.

The highest scoring men’s set so far was 29-27 in the first set during Prokopyev/Semenov’s win over China’s Wu/Xu on August 1.

The highest score for a two-set match is 89 when Brazil’s Cerutti/Emanuel Rego beat Italy’s Lupo/Nicolai, 26-24, 21-18 in 43 minutes on August 2.

The highest score for a three-set match is 121 from two matches: Switzerland’s Sascha Heyer/Chevallier beat Russia’s Prokopyev/Semenov, 28-26, 18-21 and 15-13 in 69 minutes in July 30 and on August 1 when Russia’s Prokopyev/Semenov defeated China’s Wu/Xu, 29-27, 17-21 and 15-12 in 67 minutes.

For single-match highs, statistical leaders are:Canada’s Martin Reader (aces-5), tied for most blocks in a match are Germany’s Erdmann and USA’s Dalhausser with nine each, and Russia’s Sergey Prokopyev (29 digs).

Brazil’s Alison and Ricardo are tied for second with single game highs of eight blocks with Cerutti getting it twice and Ricardo once.

In digs in a single match, Switzerland’s Sebastian Chevallier is second with 26 and USA’s Rogers is third with 25.

Men’s beach volleyball continues daily at Horse Guards Parade in the London 2012 Olympic Games until the medal matches on Thursday, August 9.