For the second successive match, the New Zealand women’s beach volleyball pair stood one point from victory, but were not able to get over the line.
In their semi-final against favourites Canada, the New Zealanders – Alice Zeimann and Shauunu Polley – had three match points but ended up losing a marathon three-setter.
And in the subsequent bronze medal play-off against Miller Pata and Shervsyn Toko of Vanuatu, history repeated itself.
The New Zealanders looked on track for a medal when they eased through the first set 21-10.
The second set was much tighter – 12-10 to New Zealand, 15-12 to Vanuatu, 18-18, 19-19. Then New Zealand reached match point, but were not able to finish it off.
The Vanuatu pair fought back and squeaked out the set 22-20 before winning the third set, the tiebreaker, 15-10.
“It sucks not to get the bronze, but we’re proud of our tournament,” Polley said.
Zeimann said it was disappointing to lose such a close match again. “We know we could have been there, but we’ll take a few learnings from this.”