Harrogate Ladies Waterpolo Latest News
Pre season training in Bordeaux
The team will be setting off to Bordeaux from the 4th to 9th September for a pre season training camp.The squad will be playing against Bordeaux who are the third best team in France. We have five sessions, one on Friday night, two on Saturday and two on Sunday. Included in this are three matches.
On Saturday night we are invited to dinner hosted by the President of the club with all their team members. So best frocks, girls (Harry and Chris, you can wear yours too, if you want!)
The girls will be staying at an Etap Hotel in central Bordeaux.
If it can be organized, there will be a training and game session at Cholet (Mens team) on Thursday night when we arrive and the possibility of a swim training session on Monday if we want.
We have nine players going on this trip, Jules, Sarah, Allison, Rachael, Laura, Ashley, Jessica and Liz with Chantelle from Caledonian standing in for our goalkeeper Lindsey who will be in Greece at the European Championships with GB Juniors.
Jessica from Sunderland and Liz from Walsall are joining our squad for the new season. Welcome to them both.
Harrogate's 2008 National League Campaign
Harrogate's 2008 National League campaign starts in Grantham on the 27th and 28th September with their first game against newly promoted Liverpool C. The aim this year is for the team to get into the top 4 of Division 1 with the view to playing in Europe in 2009.Harrogate's Holland Campaign 2007
The team arrived in Amsterdam for their second visit to the Het Y Tournament in good spirits, but quite tired after various late flights from the UK. Tents were all prepared as usual by Joan and food was on the table. The Saturday matches were in the top Division this year all against Dutch teams. They were the local club Het Y, Arethusa from the South of Holland and Sassenheim.
The weather was warmish but not too sunny when we played against Arethusa. They were an experienced team and caused us some trouble. We settled down well though and ran out convincing winners.The second match was against local club Het Y, with the chief referee also being local. This was a very different match and one where we went into an easy 4-0 lead in the first half. The second half was a very strange affair, with the referee giving Het Y four penalties and seven man ups! In other words, every time they got the ball, they got a major. However, they only managed to score three goals so we won 4-3.
Last match of the day was against Sassenheim, who had lost to Het Y but only just. We controlled the match and used it to try out a variety of moves and techniques as preparation for the National League. We went onto win 7-4.
Saturday night was a trip into Amsterdam, followed by disco at pool. Late to bed for the second night!
In Sunday’s matches, teams in position one and four played each other, so we were up against Arethusa again. We expected to win and go on to meet Het Y in the final. We were therefore a little surprised to be two goals down after three minutes and had to grind out the rest of the period. We started to take control and ran out fairly easy winners at 8-6.
It was clear that the Dutch teams were determined that the winner would come from Holland and pulled out all the stops. Het Y were then beaten by Sassenheim, which upset the locals a little, so we met Sassenheim in the final.
Both of the Sunday matches had been scheduled for the smaller pitches so that we could get to the airport on time, but these pitches cause us some problems in the first match. We were so quick that we were grouping together and getting each other’s way! Because of this, some tactics were changed and we took on this match with a little more serious thought. The final score was 8-3, which included a goal by Lindsey from her goal line straight into their net.
Overall a great weekend, good fun, drier this year, and a lot learned.
