Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour: In Bhubaneswar, players’ minds on conflict back home

BHUBANESWAR: Competition travelled to the Bhubaneswar Challenge on Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour. So did fear. Israel’s beach volleyball pair Eylon Elazar and Kevin Cuzmiciov arrived in Bhubaneswar chasing points on the global tour.

They leave with a bronze medal — and days of worry over a widening US-Israel-Iran conflict that has shaken air travel, unsettled athletes and forced teams to rethink their journeys.Players tried to focus on serves and spikes, but phones, news alerts and family messages became constant distractions. Originally, athletes from 52 countries were expected for the tournament. In the end, about 100 participants from roughly 30 nations managed to reach Bhubaneswar.

Elazar and Cuzmiciov nearly missed it. “We were on one of the last two flights coming out of Tel Aviv before they closed the airspace,” Elazar said. “Then in Abu Dhabi we waited for two days after which we took one of the 15 flights from there and came to Bengaluru.”For American teams, travel uncertainty has become a new source of stress. US coach Edward Keller said: “How can we fly with these airspaces getting interrupted?” Six US teams — three men’s and three women’s — reached Bhubaneswar.

“It’s uncertain how safe it’s going to be in different parts of the world,” Keller said.Danish pair Nicolai Hovmann Overgaard and Jacob Stein Brinck face a marathon route. “We will fly from Bhubaneswar to Mumbai, then from Mumbai to Baku,” Brinck said. “From Baku we go to Tbilisi, then to Istanbul and Copenhagen before heading home.”