It was time again for the BUSA Canoe Polo Chamionships at Hatfield Water Park in Doncaster. Although a student competition, an Open League was set up for University old boy teams, and anyone else who cared to enter. I entered a Cardiff Old Boys team, comprising of Old Cardiff uni club members and a couple of folk from the local welsh polo club, Aberfan.
The weekend started off with a slight hiccup having discovered the boats didn't fit in the panel van. Well Done!!! It wouldn't be a canoe club weekend without a certain degre (read: alot) of faff. Anyways, up to Doncaster we went. Many beers later it was time for bed. It was freezing. That will learn me for camping in April with a 2 season sleeping bag!!!
Saturday dawned and it was bright and sunny. The girls and the uni team were on early, but the Old Boys had the luxury of a much needed lie in to nurse the hangovers. Our games didn't start till 1.30pm. Bliss. However, being the athletes we are, a warm up was scheduled for midday. Out came the beers, and a few games of polo were watched. Throughout the afternoon the team performed flawlessly - the warm up worked wonders obviously!!!
Only one close call where we managed to miss the start of the game and played one half with only 4 players. The cavalry arrived for the second half and we went on to win 5-1 against Warwick uni Olds. So four games down on saturday and four wins. Top performance and well pleased. We were through to the quarters on the sunday. Time for more beer!!!
Sunday came and it was an even better day than the saturday. Warm and sunny. Perfect for polo. Our quarter final match was against Leeds White Rose. A cagey affair, hard fought, and sometimes not played strictly within the rules. All good fun though. 2-2 at full time after a wonder goal from the half way from Rob saw it go to golden goal extra time. Tense. Still 2-2 so down to penalties. Three pens a peice were saved, including mine. All square after the first round so to sudden death. Would you belive it, mr polo himself Elan Winter was the culprit. His was saved. We were out. Now, i am not going to instill a blame culture here, but if Elan had scored we would have won, so, i guess its his fault!!! haha!
So that was it, the dream was over. A play off lead to Cardiff coming a respectable, but a little dissapointing 5th out of 20. Ah well. It was a top weekend (although alot of the reffing was extremely dubiuos). Good to catch up with old buddies from the polo world.
The weekend started off with a slight hiccup having discovered the boats didn't fit in the panel van. Well Done!!! It wouldn't be a canoe club weekend without a certain degre (read: alot) of faff. Anyways, up to Doncaster we went. Many beers later it was time for bed. It was freezing. That will learn me for camping in April with a 2 season sleeping bag!!!
Saturday dawned and it was bright and sunny. The girls and the uni team were on early, but the Old Boys had the luxury of a much needed lie in to nurse the hangovers. Our games didn't start till 1.30pm. Bliss. However, being the athletes we are, a warm up was scheduled for midday. Out came the beers, and a few games of polo were watched. Throughout the afternoon the team performed flawlessly - the warm up worked wonders obviously!!!
Only one close call where we managed to miss the start of the game and played one half with only 4 players. The cavalry arrived for the second half and we went on to win 5-1 against Warwick uni Olds. So four games down on saturday and four wins. Top performance and well pleased. We were through to the quarters on the sunday. Time for more beer!!!
Sunday came and it was an even better day than the saturday. Warm and sunny. Perfect for polo. Our quarter final match was against Leeds White Rose. A cagey affair, hard fought, and sometimes not played strictly within the rules. All good fun though. 2-2 at full time after a wonder goal from the half way from Rob saw it go to golden goal extra time. Tense. Still 2-2 so down to penalties. Three pens a peice were saved, including mine. All square after the first round so to sudden death. Would you belive it, mr polo himself Elan Winter was the culprit. His was saved. We were out. Now, i am not going to instill a blame culture here, but if Elan had scored we would have won, so, i guess its his fault!!! haha!
So that was it, the dream was over. A play off lead to Cardiff coming a respectable, but a little dissapointing 5th out of 20. Ah well. It was a top weekend (although alot of the reffing was extremely dubiuos). Good to catch up with old buddies from the polo world.
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