Rio de Janeiro, August 6, 2016 – The Netherland’s Alexander Brouwer and Robert Meeuwsen began their Rio de Janeiro 2016 Olympic Games campaign by beating Russia’s Nikita Liamin and Dmitri Barsouk 2-0 (21-16, 21-16) at the Copacabana Beach Arena on Saturday.
Here’s what they said after the match….
Alexander Brouwer, the Netherlands
“We played here in March so we are already a little bit used to playing here, but now in a stadium like this with 12,000 people fitted in, it was awesome to play here for my first Olympic match.
“We made a schedule we think is perfect for us. It is different as normally we play six or seven matches in eight days, but now hopefully we’ll have a match every other day for two weeks.
“It is so much fun travelling around world with everyone and we have a really good group helping each other and stimulating each other and we have a really positive vibe. On one it is positive because every single team wants to compete better than the other one, but we also want the other teams to win and do really well.”
Dmitri Barsouk, Russia
“First of all, it's a game of nerves. We just need to calm down, manage our nerve situation and just play our game.
“Everything went fine in the arena. We love the people here because (they are) actually participating in the games.
“I played in London and that was a bit bigger, but everything is fine and we like the crowd is excellent.”