And then there were eight.
After Thursday’s pool play, the men’s elimination stage dominated the schedule on Friday at the A1 Major Vienna presented by Swatch and a number of the favorites for the title remain well and truly in the hunt for gold.
Among them are last year’s winners and world number ones Anders Mol and Christian Sørum who overcame losing the second set against Paolo Nicolai and Daniele Lupo to storm in the quarter-finals by taking the tiebreaker in emphatic fashion 15-7.
The Vikings, bronze medalist at the World Championships now face Swiss duo Adrian Heidrich and Mirco Gerson for a place in the semi-final.
There was late-night drama on the Red Bull Beach Arena in the day’s final match of the day as Poles Michal Bryl and Grzegorz Fijalek edged a tiebreak against Evandro Gonçalves and Bruno Oscar Schmidt. The Brazilians led 9-6 in the third but a muscle injury sustained to Bruno meant the South Americans were unable to maintain their form and that allowed Bryl and Fijalek, runners-up here 12 months ago, to reach the last eight.
The Polish pair’s reward is a quarter-final meeting against veteran Spaniards Pablo Herrera and Adrian Gavira after they beat Andre Loyola and George Wanderley also in a tie-breaker.
Brazil do have a representative in the quarter-finals and that comes in the shape of 2016 Olympic champion Alison Cerutti and his teammate Alvaro Filho saw off Qatar’s Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan in straight sets.
The schedule for Saturday is now set with Alison and Alvaro taking on World Champions Oleg Stoyanovskiy and Viacheslav Krasilnikov in the first match on the Red Bull Beach Arena at 10.15am CEST.
For the full schedule, which includes the women’s semi-finals, click here.
