Thursday 19 March 2026
Our Premier Water Polo team had a successful weekend with two wins from two games. On Friday we were victorious over current national champions Rangitoto College with one of our biggest scores ever, winning 20 – 7. Centre forward Zach Gleeson (Year 12, Averill) was in great form scoring 8 times with other scorers being Max Norwell (Year 13, Greenbank) with 3, Xavier Hazel (Year 12, Averill) and Ezra Gower (Year 11, Selwyn) with 2 each, Cooper Searle (Year 13, Greenbank), Matt Sawden (Year 13, Major), Charlie Middleton (Year 13, Averill) and Caden Fuatimau (Year 11, Averill).
Sunday night was the Auckland Grammar School match and they brought a huge and very vocal crowd - our King's supporters matched them in both numbers and volume so there was plenty of atmosphere and plenty of pressure.
The first quarter was tight and ended at 2 – 2 with Max Norwell scoring twice from penalties. The second quarter was almost entirely one way traffic as Zach scored from centre forward, Charlie Middleton beat the keeper as he scored a lovely lob shot and Max adding to his tally with another penalty and two outside shots.
Grammar could only manage one goal in reply, and we changed ends feeling confident at 7 – 3. The second quarter started with another centre goal to Zach then he managed to get two grammar defenders excluded for the match on their 3rd personal fouls in the space of two seconds with the second being a penalty offense. Max netted the penalty but despite being two players up, we also lost some energy letting in a couple of soft goals and the third quarter ended at 10 – 5.
In the fourth quarter Max continued to dominate with a further outside shot as well as another two penalties, while Grammar never gave in and scored two as well. The final score was 13 – 7 in our favour, the Weeden – Simperingham Cup remains in our possession and our captain, Max Norwell set a record for goals scored in a premier water polo match with a truly remarkable 10.
Tonight, we face Westlake Boy’s High School for a shot at the finals on Sunday.
Ben Simperingham, Ben Goodwin and Jasmin Kolasinac.