In the Olympic final, the German beach duo Ehlers/Wickler are battling with their own nerves. Instead of silver jubilation, there is gold frustration. Time will change that.
Sparklers lit up, there was applause and lots of hugs: When beach volleyball players Clemens Wickler and Nils Ehlers ran through a line of family and friends in the Paris night, their smiles briefly returned.
Not far from the spectacular stadium at the Eiffel Tower, they celebrated their silver medal in a restaurant. The pain of the crushing defeat in the final at the Olympics is likely to linger for the Hamburg team for a while.
“We didn’t find our way into the game at all, and unfortunately we played our worst game of the season in the final,” said Berlin-born Ehlers, clearly more dismayed.
The head was not playing along
The Hamburg team marched into the final in the French capital with impressive performances. But in the 0:2 (10:21, 13:21) defeat against the young world number one players from Sweden, David Ahman/Jonatan Hellvig, almost nothing worked. “Maybe they wanted too much. They had their eyes on gold and then their heads went completely blank,” Wickler tried to explain.
During the warm-up, he had the best feeling of the entire tournament. “And then we go out onto the field and everything is completely gone. Legs are completely heavy. There was definitely something that happened to us mentally,” said the 29-year-old.
The many German fans saw many serving errors, misunderstandings and other wobbles. The Swedes didn’t even have to resort to their special jumping passes very often. It was enough for them to play in a controlled manner and without making many mistakes.
“It hurts unbelievably badly, because not being able to focus on the stage and perform like that is very, very disappointing and really knocks you down,” said 30-year-old Ehlers.
The joy will come
Many supporters had travelled from home and had to travel long distances. Wickler said he was extremely sorry that they then saw such a performance. “But when I see how proud most of the German fans are of us, it helps me to be proud of our performance,” said the 29-year-old. “Because in the six games before that we sometimes exceeded our own expectations.”
The partners had set themselves an ambitious goal of winning a medal when they formed their team in 2022. The fact that they ended up winning silver is the greatest success of their careers and quite surprising.
With a little time, the joy of what has been achieved will come. “And that is also important, to realize it more and more, to convince yourself more and more,” said Ehlers. “And at some point I will be sure, I will believe it 100 percent.” The evening with loved ones will certainly have helped with that.
The next tournament is coming soon
The duo sees themselves continuing to move up. Ehlers spoke of an extremely important learning experience. Wickler was combative: “If we have the opportunity to have a similar final again at some point, we will do better.”
The Hamburg team doesn’t have much time to celebrate their silver or be annoyed about their missed opportunity because of their international schedule. The European Championships in the Netherlands begin for them on Wednesday.
Source: Stern
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