GBR Head to Georgia for Water Polo Qualifier
5th April 2013
The British Gas GBR Water Polo team will be heading to Georgia at the weekend as they kick start their campaign to qualify for the LEN European Water Polo Championships in 2014.
The squad left for a pre-tournament camp on March 24th and will head to Georgia on April 3rd to play against Slovakia, Poland, Czech Republic and the hosts, Georgia.
Captain Craig Figes said: “We’re currently in Barcelona at a training camp and virtually the whole team is here. There has been a little bit more flexibility now as people are working full time or university commitments, some of the guys are training and playing full time but it’s good to be back with the team.
“We’ve played two training matches per day with additional training too before we head off to Georgia so this will help us to get back into the swing of things.
“It has been a difficult period for the team since the Olympics, we lost our funding and the programme has been very much reduced but we’re looking forward to getting back into the water and playing together again.
“It’s difficult to predict the results, lots of teams are at different stages. Georgia has lost a lot of experience players recently, we haven’t played Poland or Czech Republic for around five years so we don’t know how we compare at the moment.
“We’ll be playing four games in three days, so it’s a tough schedule but we will do our best and put in 100 per cent and hopefully come away with some good results.”
The British Gas GBR Water Polo team is:
• Adam Scholefield (Leeds) – Rotherham Metro
• Craig Figes (Bristol) – Bristol
• Ciaran James (Lancaster) – Lancaster
• Edward Scott (Bolton) – City of Manchester
• Jack Waller (Enfield) - Invicta
• Jake Vincent (Solihull) – Solihull
• Matthew Holland (Carshalton) – Sutton and Cheam
• Robert Parker (Cheltenham) – Cheltenham
• Sean King (Farnborough) - Invicta
• Sean Ryder (Nottingham) – City of Manchester
• Joe O’Regan (Oldham)– City of Manchester
• Chris Armstrong (Doncaster) – City of Sheffield
• Tom Curwen (Lancaster) - Lancaster