“The draw was quite a tough one and we ended up coming third in our pool behind two teams who went on to reach the final and semi-final,” says Marsden Housemaster and Water Polo Coach Ben Simperingham.
“Overall it was a very good tournament from our team with four wins, two losses and the plate trophy.”
In a tight encounter dominated by strong defence the Junior A’s lost the opening match to Rangitoto College 4 – 3. This match was well within our grasp, but our attack faded, and we could not find the net in the final quarter.
On Friday morning the team had a strong performance and defeated Mount Albert Grammar School 10 – 5. Brad Hall (Year 10, Major) scored four goals in this game and Tom Patten (Year 10, Marsden) added a further three.
In the evening match we needed to beat the undefeated Sacred Heart College by three goals to go through to the championship round. With the score 1 – 1 at the end of the first quarter the possibility of a win remained, however Sacred Heart College gradually drew away resulting in our final result of a 5 – 2 loss.
That loss put us into the plate round where the team started to play some very attractive water polo. They played two very satisfying matches on Saturday, defeating both Aquinas College and Auckland Grammar School by the same score of 6 – 4.
The Auckland Grammar School result was the tournament highlight for the team as it is only the second time we have beaten our traditional rivals at the Junior A level. Our biggest contribution on attack came from Brad Hall who managed a hat trick, with Hamish Dalziel (Year 9, School House) scoring two goals and Jack Gilleece (Year 10, Marsden) getting on the score sheet also, as well as leading our defence.
On Sunday we beat a weaker Saint Kentigern College side by 17 – 0 with all our team adding to the score sheet. Well done to Jamie Robertson (Year 10, Greenbank) who managed a hat trick inside the first quarter of play.
