A sour defeat: Barts vs Southampton Uni

For the first match of the BUCS campaign, Southampton University’s men’s team travelled to London to face Queen Marys. Being a weak adversary in previous seasons meant that sprits was high, especially following an intense pre-season where the team had showcased their potential, with their performances in the Hampshire League eclipsing anything from the previous year.

The evening began with an unconventional journey to the pool using public transport after the unfortunate incident that occurred to the minibus during the woman’s team trip to London the previous week. This did however give the opportunity to site see around the stunning glass filled skyline of Canary Wharf.

Upon arriving at the pool and commencing the warmup, it became clear BARTs had recruited some talented and experienced players this year turning them a formidable force; a close match was in prospect.

The first quarter got underway and the preseason form shone through. Daniel Ammon putting up an outstanding pit defence, with Alex Wilmshurst and Woody Cho providing crash support from the posts preventing the ball ever leaving the pit man’s hand. The first goal came soon after with Dan proving he was not only the linchpin of Southampton’s defence but also a threat in attack, scoring from the top of the arc. Each offensive play in the first quarter was set up perfectly, Jack James or Finn Thomas winging out to receive the ball from Luke Bennalick in goal, converting the pressure from their defender into a minor foul (giving Sam Dalton time to set up in the pit) before building the attack. Whilst limited opportunities were converted, the form was promising, with another goal coming from Alex as he precisely lobed the ball over the keeper into the bottom left corner. The stonewall defence, including during a man down, was only broken once all quarter providing Southampton with an early one goal lead.

However, the match was seemingly too competitive for the referee’s liking. As a result, on the advent of the second quarter, the first of the referees’ alternative rules was implemented, deciding that a climbing frame in the shallow end would be required to improve the game.

The second quarter began, Southampton now defending the deep. The same beautiful defence that had served the team well in the first quarter was deployed, proving equally as effective in the deeper water, Noah Boelmann and Qi Zhe putting in heroic swims up/down the wings to keep their players marked tight. Unfortunately, the same could not be said in attack. Despite setting up the arc, the new ‘climbing frame’ rule seemed to entitle up to three BARTs players to clamber over Sam in the pit, using a combination of his body and the floor to intercept any ball into him without punishment, foiling the majority of Southampton’s attacks. Recognising the nonsense that was happening in pit Finn elected to use his killer shot to smash the ball past the keeper from the top of arc to bolster the score line. BARTs Number 7, responded going on to score a hattrick (including a converted penalty) over the course of the quarter, enabling BARTs to take the lead for the first time in the game. Two of these goals were optimistic mop up’s from initially successful defences. The first of which occurred after a series of two consecutive saves that went wide and the second an unsuccessful (and very messy) attempt by Luke, Alex and Woody to clear the ball up field. The quarter concluded with a last second shot from BARTs, skilfully clearing Southampton’s forest of hands to reach the back of the net, the score line 5:3 to BARTs at the quarters conclusion.

A tense halftime team talk ensued, the team furious with the standards being displayed by the referees. In response Alex volunteered to go into pit, freeing Sam to punish BARTs with his signature lightspeed shots from the posts. The referees also had their own team talk, probably to decide on a new set of rules to ignore after seeing that their plan had been thwarted and would be less effective at suppressing Southampton’s deep end attack.

Before progressing with this report, it is important to reflect on the following. During your first session of Water Polo, most players learn two fundamental rules:

You may not touch the ball with two hands (excluding the keeper)

You may not put the ball under the water (this rule further clarified in January 2023 to prevent the ball being hidden by any means in all phases of play).

Well, at the start of the third quarter, the players in this match needed to be prepared to forget them.

BARTs were evidently more intune with this sudden rule pivot, deciding to consistently violate these fundamentals, obviously without any consequence. An early exclusion led to a goal from BARTs, slotting the ball past Luke into the bottom right corner despite another excellent man down defence from the team. Attacks were traded back and forth with no effect on the score line before, with the quarter drawing to a close, Finn broke free with the ball and made a beeline for the goal. Raising the ball behind, the inevitable penalty foul was committed but no whistle was heard. Finn assumed advantage had been played scoring his second goal of the day. Unfortunately, this was not the case, the refs deciding that instead they would roll back the play to a minor foul. Thinking quickly, Alex drove out the pit towards the left post, receiving a swift pass from Finn and burying the ball back into the net. Celebrations were short lived with the refs rolling back the play once again to a minor foul due to claiming the foul was taken within the 2 meters… The second attempt at a quick pass and shot was not so effective, the ball clearing the cross bar. The third quarter ended 6:3. Edward Wilkes, the honorary dry coach, assuring team that a win was still on the cards during the team talk if we shot from the top line (to avoid the shenanigans in the pit) and used our improved fitness from a packed pre-season to outswim the tiring BARTs.

With renewed confidence, Southampton entered the final phase of the match. Sam Dalton capitalised early with a clinical goal from the post position. BARTs responded with two goals of their own. Trailing by four, Finn seeked to make amends, converting a minor foul outside six meters to a goal, playing the ball on the water in front of him, swimming towards the post and placing the ball (at speed) past the keeper. Finn attempted to make it two in a row only for the ball to bounce around the posts. No goal the unsurprising view of the refs although this one was admittedly a borderline decision that even our pit forward could not call. The momentum gained was stunted as BARTs scored two more from the wings due to some sloppy keeping and defence (especially given their previous attempts at these shots had been successfully saved). In the final minutes of the game, Southampton managed to do the impossible and score from the pit, Alex adding a fine addition to his goal tally. With only 30 seconds on the clock, BARTs ran out the time, Number 7 showcasing his favoured two-handed gameplay in the process.

The final score 10:6 to BARTs, after a first quarter that promised a close competitive game, there was a mutual feeling of what should have been an incredible game being tainted by appalling officiating. The team will be fired up for the rematch to show what an accurate score line would have looked like.

All that was left was to journey home, sampling the produce in Waterloo station for a much needed energy boost prior to catching the train back to Southampton.

Man of the Match: Daniel Ammon

Nearly faultless pit defence forcing nearly all BARTs goals to be shot from the arc. Also did not get a single major, juxtaposing his pre-season form of getting wrapped from 50% of games!

Special mention must also go to Alex Wilmshurst for organising the transport to/from the match, a logistical nightmare due to the wide range of locations team members had to travel from to reach the game.

Dick of the Day: The ‘new’ rule set the match was played under.

Need more be said.

Player/Goals/Majors

Luke Bennalick 0/0

Sam Dalton 1/0

Jack James 0/1

Finn Thomas 2/1

Qi Zhe 0/0

Noah Boelmann 0/1

Daniel Ammon 1/0

George Lea 0/0

Alex Wilmshurst 2/0