SEA Games 2023: PH men’s beach volleyball team bags another bronze medal

Philippine men’s beach volleyball team. –PNVF

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippines salvaged a bronze medal in the men’s beach volleyball competition, the sport’s lone medal in the 32nd Southeast Asian Games in Cambodia.

The men’s national team settled for bronze for the third straight SEA Games after sweeping Vietnam in the battle for third, 2-0, on Tuesday.

Alnakran Abdilla and Jaron Requinton gutted out the first game with a 21-18, 29-31, 17-15 victory over the duo of Lam Toi Nguyen and Quang Vu Tran.

James Buytrago and Jude Garcia, however, made sure to not make the same mistakes and notched a systematic 21-14, 21-15 win in the second game to sweep Van Nha Nguyen, Van Thanh Nguyen.

BRONZE FOR THE PHILIPPINES 🇵🇭 Congratulations to our Philippine Men's Beach Volleyball team composed of Ran Abdilla, Jaron Requinton, Jude Garcia, and James Buytrago, for winning the #SEAGames2023 Bronze medal after beating Vietnam! Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! 🇵🇭 pic.twitter.com/GzZcD8VvNR

— Volleyball Philippines (@volleyball_phi) May 16, 2023

After finishing with a 3-1 record in Pool A, the Philippines advanced to the semifinals only to lose against Indonesia, 2-0, and be relegated to the bronze medal match.

Their women’s counterpart, however, had an early departure from podium contention after finishing with a 1-2 round robin record in the pool play.

Both the Philippines’ men’s and women’s indoor volleyball teams also came up empty-handed in this edition of the SEA Games.

The Philippine men’s team placed fifth anew after a winless preliminary round while the women’s team finished fourth after dropping its bronze medal match to a familiar opponent in Indonesia.