Home title favorites Alison Cerutti/Bruno Oscar Schmidt swept Daniele Lupo/Paolo Nicolai of Italy 2-0 here Thursday evening to capture the men's beach volleyball gold medal at the Rio Games.

Alison/Bruno, who had been crowned at the World Championships in 2015, posted the 21-19 and 21-17 victory in 45 mintues.

"It took a lot of dreaming and a lot of desire. I have believed in making this and I found a partner that believed in this too," said Alison. "It was four years of hard work. A lot of dedication, a new team, and a lot of faith. That's what brought us here today."

"It's a dream come true. My gosh, this past two weeks was so hard. I'm so exhausted, totally exhausted," said Bruno. "Since the day that we started, three times I have almost stopped playing, almost said, 'I'm done, I'm too tired to try hard'. Since we built this team, I knew we would have other chances to follow our dreams and Alison was a monster today."

Earlier on Thursday, Alexander Brouwer/Robert Meeuwsen of the Netherlands beat Russia's Viacheslav Krasilnikov/Konstantin Semenov 23-21 and 22-20 to take the bronze medal.

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