2009-10 Annual Report - Australian Water Polo Inc

The Aussie Stingers front for a match at the FINA World Championships in Rome.
Institute Challenge
The annual Institute Challenge was held at the AIS
in November and was won by QAS with WAIS second,
NSWIS third, Composite fourth and Victoria fifth. This
year the Composite team was bolstered by the addition
of three USA players and Mieke Cabout (Netherlands
Olympic gold medallist), which made for some close and
entertaining games.
After the Challenge, 21 players were chosen for a
training camp with 13 being selected to tour Canada and
USA.
Canada Cup
A new-look team was selected for the Canada
Cup and USA Holiday Cup tour. This was due to the
unavailability of Kate Gynther (work), Rebecca Rippon
(break), Alicia McCormack and Holly Lincoln-Smith
(shoulder operations). The team included three players
aged under 18 — Zoe Arancini, Isobel Bishop and Kelsey
Wakefield — plus Elise Rossato making her Australian
debut, while Gemma Beadsworth was returning from a
study break.
After playing some very entertaining water polo
throughout the week we went down to the USA in the
final 8-7 with the USA scoring in the final minute to
secure the victory.
We opened the series with an encouraging 8-4 win
over the USA, beat Italy 14-9, Canada 15-8 and Canada
again in the semifinals, 10-9 in overtime.
Holiday Cup
The team continued its improvement and won the
Holiday Cup in impressive style for the third time and the
first since 1999. In the process we drew with the world
champion USA 7-7, defeated the world silver medalilst
Canada 12-6, world bronze medallist Russia 11-9 and
Olympic gold medallist Netherlands 10-5.
Training Camps
We held a seven-day training camp in January (AIS)
before the NWPL and two, four-day training camps in
February (Gold Coast) and March (Sydney). Twenty
athletes attended each camp, but personnel changed
from camp to camp.
Unfortunately, the Commonwealth Championships,
for which we were preparing, were rescheduled from
April until October.
We then held a five-day training camp (AIS) during
the NWPL break before the finals. Twenty-six players
were selected to attend this camp whom we believed
had the potential to be national team members.
FINA World League
After the National League finals, we selected a squad
of 20 athletes to attend a five-day selection camp at the
AIS in Canberra. From this squad we selected 14 players
to compete in the rounds of the FINA World League in
Japan and China.
We qualified top of the Oceania region after defeating
Japan 18-5 and 16-4, Kazakhstan 14-9 and 14-8. In our
two games with China, we played some very entertaining
water polo, but unfortunately in the first game in Japan
we failed to capitalise on our opportunities and paid the
penalty by having an 8-8 draw in regular time, then losing
the match 13-12 in a penalty shootout.
This then put us in a difficult position of having to win
all our games in China to qualify first. This was made
more difficult as we lost Gemma Beadsworth, who had
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