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February’s England polo club news is out! -

In our monthly newsletter we try to shine a light on what is going on in English water polo clubs.  If you have any news or events please do let us know.  We can be contacted at ah@waterpoloengland.org. We are conscious that we are only able to capture a small part of what is going on.  We would love to showcase your club or publicise tournaments you are running.

January has been a month when many clubs have been concentrating on the British Water Polo League competitions.

image credit BWPL

 

Solihull Water Polo Club are continuing their journey in the Super 5s championship.  After rejoining the British League with a young team in 2012, they charged up the lower divisions season by season, and they are now bidding for the top prize – as men’s Super 5s champions.  They were the only team to win both their matches at Luton in January.  They enjoyed a 7-3 victory over reigning champions Cheltenham and an 11-6 victory over Lancaster.   London Polytechnic also made an impressive start to their campaign in the Super 5s with a 9-8 victory over Lancaster. However, they drew their second match against City of Manchester 6-6.

In the women’s Super 5s, City of Manchester beat Sheffield Sharks 13-9 and City of Coventry 10-6. Champions Liverpool Lizards drew 8-8 with London Otter. For all the latest news and results from the UK, go to www.bwpl.org.

Watford’s victorious travelling U13s

On 21st and 22nd January Watford Water Polo Club sent a party of twelve players aged 13 and under to compete in the annual Corrib Water Polo Club Junior Competition in Galway.  The squad joined ten other junior teams from across Ireland.

The Waford team opened their campaign with a 13-2 victory against Clontarf B team.  Next up were Clonard.  This was a tense game but the Watford team prevailed with a 6-5 victory (with the winning goal being scored with only 1.2 seconds to go!)  The team were now on a roll and made short work of Corrib B with a score of  7-1.  The team faced Clonard in the finals and won with an impressive 11-7 score to win the tournament.  Very well done to all the players.  Watford and Corrib enjoy strong links as Watford’s 1st team goalie and current GB international, Peter Pickford, and teammates Ciaran Walsh and Goran Sablic are currently playing for them.

Beckenham Water Polo Club under 16s won the Winter League on 21 January with wins over Ealing (18-2) and Watford (9-8). The team was very professional to win the first game so convincingly, whilst they showed a lot of resilience and character to snatch the title from Watford having been behind several times throughout the match.

We note that Northampton Water Polo Club are looking for some friendly matches for their 2003, 2004 and/or 2005 teams.  If you are interested please contact Head Coach Kev at the club at kevin@northamptonwaterpolo.co.uk or on 07837213742.

 

Scholarships & benefits at UK universities

This is a call-out to all University and College Sports Directors; please send us an update on the offering you make to support outstanding water polo players. England Water Polo publish a list of all the scholarships and benefits available to elite water polo players at 40+ of the UK’s Universities and Colleges, and it’s time that the information was updated.  We will be delighted to update our listings on receipt of information from you, and will be happy to publish any additional material which may be of interest to prospective students. If we don’t hear from you we will assume that our current information is up-to-date. All information to be sent for the attention of Chris Dean, cd@waterpoloengland.org.

So, we look forward to hearing from you soon, with a view to completing the update process and publishing the revised listings by mid Feb 2018.

And finally in this section, we have been contacted by a student, Thomas Lee, from South Africa who is looking for opportunities for Gap year employment in 2019 in British schools that teach water polo.   He currently plays for the South African Water Polo U17 A team.  If you may be able to help him please let us know and we will pass on his details.

 

 

Our team- mates in America

January saw the start of the Women’s Water Polo season in America.  We have four female players attending colleges in the USA.

The University of Hawai’i has two of our players – Freshman Mhari Nurthen (Otter) and Senior Claire Nixon (ex GB and Walsall).  Last year Claire recorded 27 goals, 16 assists and 22 steals for the team.   Hawai’i started the season ranked No. 6 and they opened up the 2018 season on 20th January at home at the Duke Kahanamoku Aquatic Complex, first battling with No. 4 California and ultimately falling 9-4, but bouncing back to down No. 22 Loyola Marymount on the first day at the Rainbow Invite.  The team closed out the 2018 Rainbow Invite in style on the Sunday, delivering a defeat to 24th-ranked Marist.  Claire was one of the goal scorers and Mhari made her debut with Hawaii University in the victory over Loyola Marymount.

 

The Arizona State University Sun Devils (ranked No. 5) have also been in action.  They returned to Tempe after a pre season tour in Sydney, Australia and opened their regular season at the 2018 UCSB Winter Invite in Santa Barbara, California. The tournament featured a total of six teams who finished last year in the ACWPA Top-25.  The Sun Devils opened with a dominating 12-3 victory over Cal Baptist.  The next day they defeated No. 13 Indiana, 10-3. Later the Sun Devils team faced No. 8 Michigan.  This brought together former teammates Rosie Huck (Junior at ASU) and Kathy Rogers (Freshman at Michigan).  Unfortunately Kathy was injured and unable to play.  The Sun Devils defeated Michigan 5-3.

The Arizona State Sun Devils

 

 

The No. 8 ranked University of Michigan water polo team opened the 2018 season with three games at the UCSB Winter Invite in Santa Barbara, California, and put together three impressive performances to start the year.  Starting the season against the No. 3 team (UCLA) in the country is no easy task, but the Wolverines put up a brave challenge before eventually succumbing to a 5-4 defeat.  Next up the Wolverines defeated No. 21 Cal State Northridge 14-5.  Playing in their third game of the day, the Wolverines outscored No. 19 Cal Santa Barbara 10-7.  The Wolverines showed no signs of fatigue the next day as they made short work of No. 16 San Diego 11-4.  Next up was No. 5 Arizona State University where they played another brave match finally falling 3-5.

The Wolverines

The Wolverines were back in action hosting the two-day Michigan Invitational over the weekend of 27/28 January.  The Wolverines started the day with a victory over No. 20 Wagner 10-7.  The final match of the day was against No.4 UCLA with ended with a 9-5 defeat.  On Sunday Kathy Rogers scored her first competitive goal for the Wolverines in a match against No. 9 Pacific but the team eventually fell to a 10-7 defeat.  They finished the weekend with a close fought (tied at half time) win over Megan Clarke’s team No. 24 Marist 9-6.

 

 

 

Marist

 

 

Well that’s it for this month. If you have any news about your club that you would like to share please do let me know by emailing me at ah@waterpoloengland.org.

 

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