Team Mundo beats Team Europe and is Lopes Cup champion at Follow the Beach Copacabana

Team Mundo overcame Team Europe and won, on Sunday night, the title of the Lopes Cup, held during Follow The Beach Copacabana, the biggest tournament in the world, played on Copacabana Beach and broadcast by Sportv 3. The competition has 2 thousand subscribers from twelve countries.

Team Mundo was behind losing the first two matches. The first in the mixed double with the Spaniard Antomi Ramos, number 1 in the world, and Flaminia Daina, seventh place, defeating the Brazilians João Wiesinger, 21st, and Sophia Chow, 8th in the ranking, by 6/3 7/5. In the second match, there was a lot of emotion on the court with the Italians Giulia Gasparri and Ninny Valentini winning by 6/2 2/6 11/9 over the Brazilian Rafaella Miiller and the Venezuelan Patrícia Diaz, the third best duo on the circuit. The last game had the greatest weight in the overall score and Team Europe needed to score six games in the last men’s doubles match with Michelle Cappelletti, best in the world, together with Nicolas Gianotti, 3rd. But André Baran, in 4th place, and Nikita Burmakin, 6th and former leader, came in with everything and used the confidence of the year with two important titles. With the support of the crowd they made 6/3 6/1 and the necessary game balance to lift the cup for the first time.

With two editions of the Lopes Cup, now each one has a title. The first edition was held last year in Itu (SP) with the triumph of the Europeans.

Rafaella Miiller, former number 1 in the world and with two world titles in doubles and three for Brazil by teams, celebrated the conquest: “We are very happy with the conquest. We knew every game would be difficult regardless of the lineups. Our game was super in detail, but it’s good that the boys took the victory, they played very well against Cappe and Nico and we took the title in terms of game balance”, he said.

Baran, twice world champion with the Brazilian shirt, highlighted the practically perfect match: “We always hope to win, the score was a little elastic, but it was a tough game, many 40 equal. But a lot because it was a rival duo that had never played together, nowadays at a high level it makes a difference, me and Nikita more in tune”.

Nikita Burmakin described: “The feeling is incredible. Difficult conditions because we arrived today. We weren’t adapted to the sand, the sun, the humidity, the ball. But we played with passion, with our hearts. I’m so happy that we got such a good result and were able to win.” such a cool match. The central court was incredible, very warm, a sensational place like Copacabana Beach, very satisfied”.

The competition will end this Monday with the Singles duels with the women’s final scheduled for 7 pm and the men’s final at 8 pm on the central court with broadcast by Sportv 3. Each champion will take home R$ 60,000.

The main names of the sport are in the quarterfinals that start at 10 am with the great confrontation between Rafaella Miiller against Ninny Valentini, Nicole Nobile against Giulia Gasparri, Patricia Diaz against Sophia Chow and Flaminia Daina against Sofia Cimatti. Not before 11am, André Baran faces the Italian legend Luca Cramarossa, Antomi Ramos faces Tomaso Giovannini, Nicolas Gianotti takes on the Italian Doriano Beccaccioli and Nikita Burmakin duels against Cappelletti. The women’s semifinals start at 2 pm and the men’s semifinals start at 4 pm.

Baran now wants to lift another title looking for the Singles trophy and take the big check home: “We’re coming from a heavy streak, this Monday is the last day, it’s giving everything to this Singles, the award is cool, I’m going to have fun too. I’m in Rio de Janeiro, nice tournament, nice people, honoring us. Gratitude for the affection”.

Miiller will have a tough challenge in Singles against Ninny Valentini: “Tomorrow is tough against Ninny, I already played Singles against her once, I ended up losing, now we’re going in search of the rematch, I’ll do my best on the court”.

Follow the Beach Copacabana won the prize for the best sports competition in the city of Rio de Janeiro in 2022 through the LIDE group, and became official of the wonderful city through Bill No. 7589. The competition is broadcast live on Sportv as a broadcaster oficial with transmission of the station’s channels and also Globoplay for Globoplay + channels subscribers from 19 pm.

The competition will also be broadcast on the Follow the Streaming channel – https://youtube.com/@followthestreaming4970 – in the other games on the central court until 7 pm.