The Netherlands have been announced as the hosts of the 2018-2020 CEV Beach Volleyball Continental Cup Finals – where the eventual winners will secure a spot for their country to join the beach volleyball competition of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. The competition will take place from June 22-28, 2020 with the venue to be confirmed in due course.

The Continental Cup Finals in the Netherlands follow the history-making FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships in 2015 and the 2018 EuroBeachVolley in the cities of The Hague, Apeldoorn, Rotterdam and Utrecht.

“The Netherlands are the perfect choice for the organisation of this Olympic qualifying event and I am sure that they will deliver another first-class event, as the local organisers stand out for their positive energy, enthusiasm and desire to innovate,” said CEV President Aleksandar Boricic.

“We are proud to host this unique event. We always strive to give the volleyball fans the best there is. This event represents the high-quality standard of international beach volleyball and the CEV. Together with the fans we will build a great experience. We are grateful to the CEV for their trust in our federation,” commented Dutch Volleyball Federation President Peter Sprenger.

The event in 2020 will be the third edition of the Continental Cup Finals. Back in 2012, the inaugural edition of the competition reached its climax in Moscow and Alanya where Russia and Norway secured a spot for the women’s and men’s Olympic tournament of the London 2012 Games. Stavanger in Norway played host to a double-gender event in 2016 where Austria and the Netherlands emerged as the eventual winners of the men’s and women’s competitions respectively.

The Dutch Beach Volleyball community will be hoping to repeat that same success on home soil come 2020, even though some of their elite teams – like Alexander Brouwer/Robert Meeuwsen and reigning European champions Madelein Meppelink/Sanne Keizer – will also be trying to secure their trip to Tokyo through the FIVB World Rankings.

The 2018-2020 CEV Beach Volleyball Continental Cup features teams from as many as 42 countries, with 16 per gender due to contest the final stage where a spot for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics will be at stake. As in previous editions, the exciting and intriguing ‘country vs. country’ format will be one of the main assets of the Continental Cup which is due to get underway later this year with the first phase scheduled for May / June across eight countries.

Click here for further information on the 2018-2020 CEV Beach Volleyball Continental Cup.