Making Waves Early in the Year

The year started off well for UCL Water Polo on all fronts. A record number of people signed up for tryouts and turned up during trial week. Regular trainings on Sunday, Monday and Friday evenings have had impressive turn outs with mini socials after each session.

The beginner sessions on Wednesday, at the nearby Oasis sports club swimming pool were well run by Hungarian born and trained beginners’ coach Chris Varga. Chris introduced the basics of water polo to the beginners, starting with simple legwork and then moving on to the more technical side of things with ball handling and game play. Currently, the beginners are being introduced to the dynamics of game play and performing well in their matches whilst practicing the essential basics taught earlier on. Beginners who wish to learn are still encouraged to come down but bear in mind that the learning curve will be steep!

Both LUSL teams started the academic year’s campaign extremely well. The second team faced Imperial College (last year’s champions) on the 22nd of November at their home pool. Despite putting up an admirable fight, they team lost 10-5. There is however a special mention to fresher Anatoly Bugakov (above) who scored an impressive 3 goals in his first match for UCL!

The first team also played Imperial at home the following week and achieved an impressive landmark win. In the realm of water polo, Imperial have been UCL’s fiercest rivals and it was a good start to the campaign with a win against them. Again, another special mention to fresher Kirill Baev (below) who scored 3 stunning goals in his debut match for UCL. Looks like the future of UCL Water Polo will be bright with such young talent!

Not forgetting the social element of the society, the regular Wednesday sports nights have been organised by the three happening social secretaries! A Molotov cocktail of drink, banter, fines and chunder at the Union’s Phineas bar was followed by a sleazy dance off at Roxy. Wednesday sports nights have resulted in one too many missed Thursday morning lectures and a whole host of unforgettable tales.

The three musketeers have planned the highly anticipated Welcome drinks on the 22nd of November with a unique “Cops and Robbers” theme. Guaranteed to be a laugh with lots of drink and strange games. The Water Polo scene is shaping up nicely in and out of the pool.