U15 & U18 Waterpolo teams at Nationals

Written by Zara Dannatt

We were thrilled to have both our U15 and U18 Waterpolo teams make the National Finals which took place on March 23rd at Northampton Boys’ School

Leading up to the National Finals, the majority of the team have trained outside of school either with Penguins Waterpolo Club or Ealing Waterpolo Club, where they are coached by Rumen Kurtev, who is a very experienced and knowledgeable coach We were lucky enough to be able to continue this coaching throughout all of our matches He was able to give tactics and substitutions accordingly to help us maximise our team’s potential

Our U15 team was taking part in the Intermediate Girls (Years 710) National Championship, having qualified previously by coming top in the qualifiers competition

The U15 team was first drawn into Pool Group A with King’s High School and Bolton School for Girls with matches consisting of two 5 minute halves with stops for goals and penalties We got off to a flying start with a 7-2 win against King’s High School before playing a very tight match against Bolton School for Girls with the final score being a draw (2-2) This meant we qualified as pool group winners for the semi-finals where we were up against St Bede’s We took the win 7-0 which meant we qualified for the final – a re-match against Bolton! It was another close-run game with NHEHS edging it 5-4, and crowned U15 National Waterpolo champions!