Commonwealth Games

Vanuatu Women’s Beach Volleyball team confirmed for 2023 Commonwealth Games

The team’s participation was confirmed at the line up announcement of the event by the Commonwealth Games Federation.

Vanuatu, New Zealand and Australia are the only three teams from the Oceania region that are participating in the sport.

Vanuatu team will be competing against teams such as the host Trinidad & Tobago,Rwanda, Canada, Mozambique, CaymanbIslands, England, Australia, New Zealand, Scotland, Kenya and Bermuda.

The games will be held from 4 to 11 August.

     

Birmingham bliss for Pacific athletes rated as one of Pacific’s top sports stories

Samoa won the region's only gold, through weightlifter Don Opolege and the nation's lifters also won three silver medals, and there was also Samoan silver in heavyweight boxing.

Fiji won four medals, two of them in the rugby sevens, but there was some disappointment that neither team could win their respective finals.

Weightlifting brought the only medals for Papua New Guinea and Nauru, Vanuatu gained a bronze from beach volleyball, and one of the stories of the games was when Niue gained its first-ever medal with a boxing bronze.

2022 Commonwealth Games comes to an end

The closing ceremony took place at Birmingham's Alexander Stadium this morning with performances from artists including UB40, Apache Indian, Beverley Knight, Dexys Midnight Runners, Goldie, Jacob Banks, Jaykae and Jorja Smith.

The ceremony also included a tradtional handover of the Commonwealth Games flag to Australia which will is set to host the next Games in 2026.

After a record-breaking Games of both individual and team success, New Zealand cyclist Aaron Gate took on the roleas the country's flagbearer.

Pacific's impressive Games haul

Samoa won the region's only gold, through weightlifter Don Opolenge and the nation's lifters also won three silver medals. They also gained a silver in boxing.

Fiji won four medals overall, two of them in the rugby sevens, but there will be some disappointment that neither team could win their respective finals.

Weightlifting brought the only medals for Papua New Guinea and Nauru.

Vanuatu gained a bronze from beach volleyball, and Niue gained its first-ever Games medal since being able to compete since 2002, with a boxing bronze.

Full list of Pacific medals:

Vanuatu wins first Games medal

Sherysyn Toko and Miller Pata defeated the New Zealand duo of Shaunna Polley and Alice Zeimann in a thrilling deciding third set in Birmingham on Monday morning.

The pair lost the first set 10-21, but edged the second 22-20, and won the decider 15-10.

The Vanuatu team had topped its group ahead of England, and beaten Cyprus in two sets in the quarter-finals.

However, they lost to Australia in the last four to set up the bronze-medal play-off.

     

Vanuatu to face Australia in the semifinals of Beach Volleyball

Miller Pata and Sherysyn Toko recorded another outstanding win after defeating the Republic of Cyprus  2-0 (29-27, 30-28) in the quarterfinals.

The duo have been impressive so far in the games and have remained undefeated.

Pata and Toko will be playing against Australia in the semifinals tomorrow.

     

Vanuatu Judo winless so far in Birmingham

Twenty-six-year-old Hugo Cumbo lost by Ippon 10-0 to Uros Nikolic of Australia in the Men’s 81kg elimination round.

Cumbo also represented Vanuatu at the Tokyo Olympics.

Also representing Vanuatu, Joe Mahit lost by Ippon 10-0 to Dato Matsoukatov of Cypriot in the Men’s 73kg elimination round.

In the Women’s division, Vanuatu was represented by Mariel Kalomor in the 52kg elimination round and lost by Ippon 11-0 to Kristry Marsh of Scotland.

Vanuatu Women’s Beach Volleyball team into quarterfinals

The team progressed after they defeated Solomon Islands 2-0 (21-8, 21-7) in their second pool game.

Miller Pata and Sherysyn Toko displayed yet another strong performance against Hannah U’una and Rose Gwali to take the game in straight sets.

Vanuatu will take on England in their final pool match.

The game is scheduled to be held at 6am on Friday (Vanuatu Time).

     

Vanuatu’s Namri Berii loses his first boxing event in Birmingham

The 24-year-old went down to Amit Panghal of India in the Men’s over 48kg-51kg flyweight event.

Panghal won by points and dominated all three rounds of the fight.

Panghal had a terrific start as he won the first round and continued his attacking game plan with a barrage of punches which his opponent couldn’t comprehend.

     

Pacific countries stamp their mark at the Commonwealth Games

Leading the region and the overall medal tally is Australia with 31 gold, 20 silver and 20 bronze medals.

New Zealand is in third place with 13 gold, 7 silver and 4 bronze medals.

Fiji is currently in 17th place with 2 silver medals.

Both in 20th place with 1 silver medal each are Papua New Guinea and Samoa.

72 countries are now heading into the sixth day of competitions.