With Gold Coast 2018 set to host the first ever Beach Volleyball competition at a Commonwealth Games, Team Scotland’s preparations have taken a step forward with the draw for both the men’s and women’s events confirmed, following a draw ceremony held at the Coolangatta Beachfront competition venue.

Overseen and sanctioned by the International Volleyball Federation (FIVB), the draw ceremony saw the 12 competing nations for both the men’s and women’s competitions drawn into three pools.

Scotland join Canada, Sri Lanka and Sierra Leone in Pool B of the men’s competition and, having won the European qualifier to take their place in Gold Coast, Robin Miedzybrodzki and Seain Cook are looking forward to the experience.

“It was fantastic watching the draw live last night on Facebook,” said Robin.

“It really hit us that the Games are fast approaching and gave us a glimpse of the quality of the event that the Australians are bringing together in the Gold Coast. We are very happy with the draw and are looking forward to continuing our preparations and bringing together our strategy for the pool games now that we know our schedule.”

Scotland’s women will face hosts Australia in Pool A, alongside Grenada and Cyprus, the team that beat them to an automatic qualifying place at the European qualifier. Lynne Beattie and Mel Coutts had an anxious wait in December to learn if they would receive an invitation to compete, but it’s now full steam ahead with their preparation.

“We are ecstatic at the opportunity to play the hosts on their home sand, this is a dream come true,” said Mel.

“We are also looking forward to another battle against our Small Countries counterparts Cyprus. Grenada will bring something different to us so we look forward to that challenge too. We are happy we now know who we have to play against and all the challenges they bring.”

Both men’s and women’s events will feature 12 teams of two players. The top four ranked teams were placed into the three pools in a snaking pattern according to their current FIVB Word Rankings, with the remaining eight teams then randomly drawn to complete the pools.

The allocated pools will determine the match schedule for the preliminary round-robin stage of the competition, with each team to play every other team within their pool once. Two points will be awarded for a win, one point for a loss and zero for a forfeited match. The top two teams in each pool will progress, along with the two third ranked teams with the highest number of points.

The preliminaries run from 6-9 April before culminating with the quarter-finals, semi-finals and medal matches from 10-12 April, with all matches to be held at the 4000-seat capacity Coolangatta Beachfront venue.

The three pools determined today for the women’s and men’s competitions are listed below:

GC2018 WOMEN’S BEACH VOLLEYBALL COMPETITION POOLS

GC2018 MEN’S BEACH VOLLEYBALL COMPETITION POOLS

Today’s unveiling of the pools will enable the full match schedule to be completed in mid-February.