10 February 2022
Last week, Abingdon Water Polo welcomed Stowe to play their first fixture of the new year. The water polo team have been increasingly dedicated in training to try and improve in advance of their next round of ESSA national competitions. The team were sporting their fantastic new hats and were raring to go.
The game roared into action with Abingdon scoring 6 unanswered goals in quick succession in the first quarter. Heading downhill into the shallow end of the pool is always slightly easier when setting up an attacking play so whilst Abingdon looked great going forward it was not the best measure of their attacking prowess. The second quarter, heading uphill into the deep end of the pool allowed Abingdon’s stronger swimmers and better motion off the ball to shine through. The team took the game by the scruff of the neck by this point and netted another 7 goals, Stowe did score one on a valiant counter after a moment of madness by the Abingdon defenders. 13-1 up at half time and the third quarter saw a period of complacency by the squad, with the score ending up as 4-3 for Abingdon in the third. Abingdon was reminded by their coach Aaron that they were beginners before and how it felt when we were thumped 21-1 by Charterhouse in the times before new hats and extra training. The team rallied and tightened up, playing much better polo and stopped their over confidence. The Stowe team also improved rapidly as the game went on, gaining experience through valuable game time.
The final score was 21-5, a little one sided for sure, but a great opportunity for our first ever victory. It was nice to also meet Stowe, organise future fixtures and help out another school also starting their water polo journey. We envision several fixtures over the next few years as both teams grow and develop. Both schools are keen to get the sport growing in the younger years so an intermediate fixture is probably on the horizon. It is great to have local opposition who are keen to play and hopefully we can see Stowe again soon.
Goals were scored by: Can Tugcetin – 5, Zach Cooper – 4, Johnny James – 3, Will d’Arcy – 3, Alex Cooper Marcos – 3, Chris Skelton – 2, Rob Smith – 1.
As you can see from the table below, it’s a close run race to see who this season’s top scorer will be:
| Player | Played | Goals |
| Tugcetin, Can | 6 | 6 |
| James, Johnny | 6 | 5 |
| Cooper Marcos, Alex | 7 | 5 |
| Cooper, Zach | 3 | 4 |
| d’Arcy, Will | 1 | 3 |
| Skelton, Chris | 7 | 3 |
| Smith, Robert | 7 | 1 |
| Symonds, Charlie | 5 | 1 |
| Dearden, Henry | 5 | 1 |
| Hegde, Dhruv | 6 | 0 |
| Brewer, Ianto | 6 | 0 |
| Lamsdale, Jacob | 7 | 0 |
| Jackson, Tom | 7 | 0 |
| Massey-Thompson, Joshua | 5 | 0 |
| Hewetson-Smith, Hugo | 1 | 0 |
| Watkiss, Joe | 1 | 0 |
| Adams, Charlie | 1 | 0 |
| Purcell, Henry | 1 | 0 |
