Thursday 6 August 2026
King’s students Max Norwell (Year 13, Greenbank), Rielly Erikson (Year 13, Peart) and Zach Gleeson (Year 12, Averill) recently represented New Zealand at the Under-18 Water Polo World Championships held in Portugal during the recent school holidays. Head of Aquatics, Ben Goodwin was also with the team as their Assistant Coach. The team spent nine days in Barcelona preparing for the tournament with the Canadian U18 national team and local clubs, before heading to Rio Maior, Portugal, for the Championship competition.
New Zealand was initially ranked in the second division in a pool with Colombia and Singapore and needing to win both pool play games to progress through to the top 12 and into the first division. The team connected strongly in the opening game against Colombia gaining a 26-12 win. In the second game, the team faced a much tougher opponent in Singapore who are renowned for their fast paced, attacking defence. This caused considerable difficulty for New Zealand and led to the team needing to chase a 2-goal deficit throughout much of the second half. However the New Zealand team managed to equalise and then find one more goal in the final minutes of play to take out a narrow 13-12 win and push into the top 12.
In the classification games, Turkey provided New Zealand with a physically exhausting game, pushing out to a 9-4 lead early in the second quarter through their sheer size and power, however, New Zealand’s agility and fitness allowed a strong comeback to get back within one goal, eventually going down 11-10. The second cross over game was against Hungary was the toughest game of the tournament as Hungary proved their powerhouse status beating New Zealand soundly 25-13.
The team then focused on a 9-12th semi-final against China which could see New Zealand male team obtain a best ever result of 10th place at a World Championship. Max Norwell was the standout player during this game and received Player of the Match after scoring two goals, two assists and one steal, while Rielly Erikson provided some exceptional goalkeeping to finish with a 56% save rate. New Zealand won the match 13-8.
With history already made, the team faced a rematch against Turkey in the 9th play off. It was a game of inches as teams traded goals consistently until the final buzzer. Rielly Erikson was again a presence in goal blocking at 50% while Zach Gleeson chimed into the scoring with his first goal of the tournament to help give the team a lead. Max Norwell continued his playmaking from the day before to find the net three times. Along with his goal scoring, Zach Gleeson also became a difference maker in the game as he shut down Turkey’s dangerous centre forward and made four crucial assists.
New Zealand finally found a breakthrough to get ahead 15-14 in the last minute of the game and with Turkey having the last possession it was a full team effort on defence to shut the attack down and take 9th place - the highest placing a male New Zealand team has ever placed in a World Championship!