Beach Ferns pair of Alice Zeimann and Shaunna Polley made history on Saturday night, claiming gold in the final of the Asian Beach Volleyball Championships in Thailand.

The Kiwi duo, ranked 44^th in the world, were too good for Australia's world number three pair of Taliqua Clancy and Mariafe Artacho del Solar, taking a 21-18, 26-24 win at the Ban Nong Ya Ma Community School in Roi Et.

The gold medal is New Zealand's first medal of any kind at the Asian Championships level since the inception of the competition in 2000 and comes after Zeimann and Polley finished fourth at the 2021 event.

The Beach Ferns made a solid start on Saturday night (NZ time) against the Tokyo 2020 Olympic silver-medallists to take the action-packed first set 21-18. They surged to a five-point lead at 18-13 in the second set before Australia stormed back, with Clancy attacking effectively and Artacho del Solar producing well-placed ace serves to tie the match at 18-18.

After the score was squared at 20-20, both teams fought to 24-all, when a spike from Clancy went wide which saw New Zealand net a crucial point to move ahead 25-24 before Zeimann solidly blocked Clancy to win the last point for her team and claim the historic title.

Zeimann and Polley, who finished fourth at the recent Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, were unbeaten at the tournament, topping their group before a Round of 16 win over Kazakhstan.

In the last eight, the Kiwis sent out the defending champion duo from Thailand 21-16, 24-22 and then followed that effort up with another outstanding performance in the last four - bouncing Chinese pair Xia Xinyi and Lin Meimei 21-19, 21-15.

Two other New Zealand pairs were competing at the event with Olivia MacDonald and Jasmine Milton and Katie Sadlier and Maya Dickson also in action in pool play.

Click here for full results and standings from the Asian Beach Volleyball Championships.