Jen Kessy, April Ross saddled with silver to end FIVB season

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Americans Jen Kessy and April Ross closed out two of the previous three seasons with titles on the FIVB World Tour, and were in the gold-medal match Sunday at the season-ending FIVB Phuket Open in Thailand playing for another one.

But silver will have to do this year. The second-seeded pair fell to top-seeded Xue Chen and Zhang Xi of China in the final (16-21, 14-21) to close out the 2011 beach volleyball season.

Xue and Zhang won each of their six matches this week in straight sets, and did so in the final with Zhang playing on a knee she injured in Saturday's semifinal. But the Chinese jumped out early to grab a 12-5 lead in the first set, and held on after the Americans closed the gap to 19-16.

Kessy and Ross kept it a bit closer in the second game, but China pulled ahead at 6-6 with a Xue ace, and just kept extending the lead.

It marks the second FIVB gold medal of the season for Xue and Zhang, who end up third in the final world rankings for the second year in a row. Kessy and Ross finish in fourth overall for the second straight season. Brazilians Juliana Silva/Larissa Franca and Americans Misty May-Treanor/Kerri Walsh, all of whom did not participate in Phuket, ended the season at No. 1 and 2, respectively.

The silver is the third of the summer for Kessy and Ross, who took home medals in half of their 14 FIVB tournaments (one gold, three silver, three bronze). It's the first year since 2007 that the duo didn't win more than one title.

So after the first year of Olympic qualifying, the top four teams are not a surprise. Many would anticipate that Juliana and Larissa would face May-Treanor and Walsh in the Olympic gold medal match, with Xue and Zhang meeting Kessy and Ross for bronze. With the exception of Kessy and Ross, who tied for fifth, that's exactly how the 2011 World Championships played out in June.

But the next three teams in the final rankings -- Maria Antonelli/Talita Antunes of Brazil, Greta Cicolari/Marta Menegatti of Italy, Sanne Keizer/Marleen Van Iersel of the Netherlands -- made a number of podium appearances this year as well. The Italians grabbed their third medal of the season on Sunday.

Cicolari and Menegatti, the No. 5 seed in Phuket, took down 19th-seeded Australians Louise Bawden and Becchara Palmer in the bronze-medal match (21-19, 21-15). It was their second bronze of the year, to go with a silver. And it was the Australians first semifinal appearance of the season.

Phuket was a women's-only event, as the men closed out their international season a month ago Agadir, Morocco. The 2012 schedule has yet to be announced, but Olympic qualifying will resume along with the tour.