National Div 4 - Cardiff Bs

On Saturday 2nd March, 7 players for the Cardiff B team went up to Cheltenham to play in the latest National Division 4 South West league tournament.

We had 4 games in total, the first of which was a victory. I can't remember off of the top of my head the name of the team we were playing, but it was a fairly positive start to the day. There were some clear signs of improvement from our previous team matches; players knew where to be and that keeping your cool was the best bet.

So the second game was against Bridgend. This was a game that really required a win, and was going to be the hardest of the four. The sprint was won by yours truly as you can see below. Usain Bolt would have had a tough time keeping up.

Rob Haley doing what he does best - winning!!!

Unfortunately this really is where the good things ended. The game was super scrappy, with lots of fouls not being called. I would like to say that the referees were just missing one or two, but there were simply too many during the game. To be completely impartial whilst writing, as I wouldn't want to sacrifice my integrity as a blogger, the fouls were not being called for either team. Bridgend took advantage more that Cardiff, pushing the boundary of what I would suggest is sportsman-like, yet it was a very young team and you can understand that they are still getting to grips with the fun of the game over purely driving for a win at any cost.  Cardiff's issue was with the fact that we were getting frustrated on the pitch, and this lead to missed opportunities, which we had many of. I believe the overall score was 2-0, and this reflected a loss of control from a team that should be at a stage that they can keep their cool.

The last two games were against Bristol Polarbears and Bristol Panthers. These were a couple of cracking games.

The first of the two games was against the Polarbears, which was a close contest. Cardiff was trying to play 5-out, which is essentially man marking. This has to be played very tight, otherwise it leaves the goal completely open for a shot from anywhere on the pitch. Although a slow uptake, the tactic worked fairly well. I'm not sure if fitness is the issue, or simply a lack of understanding, because the 'man marking' was fairly loose and this lead to some issues. This game ended in a draw. And in my book a draw is as good as a loss!

The final game of the day was against the Panthers, whom I believe were meant to be the better team. You can see one of their team (purple) in a sprint against the Meridian (black) side in the league below (this happens to be a foul. What I like about it is that he puts his paddle up in the last frame as to say 'I haven't done anything wrong here').

A cracking end to a sprint

This game was another corker, with Cardiff again attempting the 5-out play. I say attempting because the play we were running looked nothing like a 5-out should; with complete disorder from our team. However the Bristol team seemed unable to convert the chances they got (due to the poor defence/marking from us) and we happened to win this game, which was a nice ending to the day.

Overall I would suggest the day was a positive for the B team, we saw our failing from last time and improved slightly. Although we had issues this tournament, we can surely work on these for the future.

South West Division 2

Sunday 3^rd February was South West League Division 2, and unfortunately I have to write a post about it. Don’t worry, if you feel like you’ve gone as far as you can with this one already I wouldn’t judge you for leaving.

So it was a polo tournament, and the worst part of it was that my alarm was set for 0640. It went off this morning (Sunday) and I had this impending thought that it was Monday and that I had work. When I realised I was waking up for polo the thought transformed into a nightmare. I got a lift to Milfield School, which is the venue for the competition, with Phil. Now this school is something else, the grounds are huge and the pool is amazing. However there are creepy photos of the kids in the pool area; these photos are arty and look as though the photographer is chucking buckets of water around. Real weird.

The team I was playing for was Cardiff B, and we were playing a couple Bristol teams, a Bath team and then a couple teams that call themselves something other than where they’re from. I dunno why they do this, it’s not big and it’s not cool. It just makes them sound lame, an example being Ninja Beavers. I have Googled this however and there seems to be a significant amount of Ninja Beaver images:

Ha, a beaver wouldn't be able to tie a bandanna around it's head 

 So, the polo;

 Well this happened,

And then this, although this one is a foul

This chap reached for the ball, he may or may not have eventually got it.

This guy swam. If you played canoe polo you would know that this is embarrassing.

This is just a arty photo to spruce up the post

As for Cardiff; we won 2, drew 2 and lost one. However the one we lost was a scratch game, so in reality we won that one 3-0; isn't that exciting?

I would say that I hoped you enjoyed the post, but it would be comparable to asking someone who had just paid to see The Hobbit in the cinema whether they enjoyed that. They clearly wouldn't have, and the icing on the cake would have been the extraordinarily expensive ticket prices that cinemas seem to charge now-a-days.

Welsh League Div 1 - Second day

Today was the second Welsh League Division 1 day competition in Newport pool, and Cardiff had 2 teams involved. This year, as the B team was promoted, Cardiff has split its players across the two teams, so they are evenly matched. However, due to a few members other commitments, there was only 10 people in attendance. This meant each team had no substitutes. Cardiff A vs. Cardiff B was the second game of the day, and therefore we would see who the better team was. The team I (Rob Haley) was playing for consisted of Matt Creed, Matt Jenkins, Phil Stephens, Adam Voyle and myself.

This game was hard fought, and particularly close, however Cardiff A won (the team I was playing for, but I assume you already guessed that).

Our next game was Tawe, who are aggressive but we showed them who's boss. The first half we came out strong to take the lead, and by the end of the half you could tell who the superior side was. Although we reigned it in in the second half, we still won convincingly.

Our final game against Rhondda was tougher, but we still managed to get the win.

Cardiff Bs, consisting of Phil Darlington, Dave Morgan, Rif Malki, Dylan Dixon and a chap I haven’t met before; Harry Something-or-Other. This team had their second game against Bridgend. Unfortunately they lost this one also, but with the first half a draw, it looked as though it could have been a Cardiff win. Unfortunately they just fell apart in the second half.

You can see Dylan here defending the ball. (Well done Dylan, but it didn't help. You still lost)

Dave smiling here (not sure what about. if you remember, they lost this one)

They won their last game, which was the mighty Tawe.

Dylan again

This is that Harry fella. Looks like he just took a shot at goal

Phil D - lol

Now, I was having a look through some of the photo's that I was taking, and noticed I had a lot of Elan Winter (played for Aberfan, but also trains with Cardiff). I'm sure Freud would have something to say about this, but I think nothing of it. Here are some of the gems;

50 shades of Elan

Once again, an uninspiring Polo blog. Hopefully when Andy F mans up the blog will be rejuvenated. 

Welsh League - Div2- 06/01/2013

So it's the first day tournament of 2013 for Welsh League Division 2. Cardiff C's were set up to play, and got to the pool in Newport in plenty of time for the first game. However they realised one of the team members was not present. A quick phone call found him in bed with a hang over, leaving just four of them in Newport. With 20 minutes until their first game, albeit Cardiff Uni, this was not looking good for them.

This is when Rob Haley of Stuff The Consequences fame gets the call! It's basically the same as when Jim Gordan, from the recent Batman trilogy, lights up the Batman floodlight; Jim needed a hero to save the day, and so did the Cardiff team. Luckily for them I have nothing to do on my weekends (and I told Adam Voyle that I would play), so I was free as a bird. However I don't have roofracks for my car (Joanna), the reason for which is discussed here, so it was to fit a 3m polo boat in a 1.1 Citroen Saxo; Luckily I am an Engineer, making this child's play.

I turned up to the pool after Cardiff C's beat the Uni 7-3, so was a good start for them. The next Game was the better of the two Bridgend teams we were to meet. This game unfortunately didn't go as well as their first game. It seems that I was not much of a hero, but more of a drag leading to a loss. However the following game against Breacon was a convincing 9-0 victory for Cardiff. With the final game against the second Bridgend team, it was on. We came out victorious, with a scoreless first half, and an exciting second to see the score in the realm of 4-2 to Cardiff.

So overall 3 wins and 1 loss is a solid day. Now here are some photos taken using my new NIKKOR 55-300mm Lens, which are much more exciting that a match report!

Nice blurry background!

 

Stu of Cardiff Uni smiling (but probably not over a win!)

Zoe with her eyes closed (probably not textbook passing)

Luc looking like he may save a shot. (I will take away any suspense; the ball went in the net) 

Smiling again. Hhmmm, maybe him and Lucie had a special interlude

BlogThis!

Cardiff B's in Nationals

This year Cardiff B team has entered into the National Division 4 Canoe Polo League. So this means we're all lucky enough to have to play even more polo. Luckily I have nothing to do with the organising of this tournament, or any of the Cardiff B stuff to be fair, so all I have to do is turn up on time on the day.

Arriving at Cheltenham, which is where the tournament for the South West is held, I was actually feeling slightly excited, even though that morning I was in no way up for polo. I liken the experience to a prostate exam; even though there is a thrill and exhilaration to having a finger up the bum, pre and post finger is full of nerves and regret. I.e. Canoe Polo is fun while you're playing, but before and after it's as though you don't wanna go or you regret going.

So we got into the polo, and watched the first game. Well I say game, when you see a bunch of incompetent chumps paddling in an erratic display of cluelessness you can't really call it a game.

Chump shot 1

Luckily we were on the next game. Again I say game, I dunno what it was, possibly the fact that seeing a bad game made us play badly, but we were just as crap as the rest of the chumps in the pool. Its like the Canoe Polo association had managed to seal in a good proportion of morons, Cardiff included, but never managed to eliminate the lot through a good old terrorist-like attack. Fortunately we did win this game, although probably undeservedly.

Bridgend played after us, and as always they were actually a good team that could play well together. But our second game was against them. This really showed up how poor our polo is. Obviously we lost, mostly because we play like a rabbit in the headlights.

Chump Shot 2

Above is Meridian vs Bristol (or something like that), and our next game was against Bristol (greens). Now this turned out to probably be our best game. The first half we managed to use tactics, which is generally out of our realm. But it was working, we were 1-0 up. In the second half there was a drawing goal scored, so the decision was to play 5 out. We didn't play this very well, as man marking is not the forte for the team, but we got a goal to win the game, so a positive outcome from a good first half and scrappy second.

An actual goal

Our last game was against some team, I don't remember their name, but they weren't exactly good. And this is where my heart sinks, because we lost. (we didn't actually lose, it was a draw. But drawing to a shit team is basically losing. It's kinda like saying stalemate in chess is a draw. It isn't, in chess everyone losses, esp. in the event of a draw)

So that sums up a pretty crappy set of games by Cardiff B's. Hopefully we'll learn from this and actually try in the next comp.

Till then...

First South West

Sunday 23^rd September saw the first day of the South West division for Cardiff Canoe Polo Club this season. With Andy Francis dislocating his arm at the last competition I have yet again had to write for Polo The Consequences. I very much hope this doesn’t become an ongoing theme, as I am not overly keen for the polo discipline, and obviously I hope Andy gets better or whatever. However, as I have to put up some info on the games, it gives me the opportunity to display some photos from my new DSLR camera. There has also luckily been a Kayak The Consequences blog recently if you would like to read and watch a video.

On the Monday before the weekend, I received a phone call from Blondie, one of the A-team players, asking me to play on the Sunday. I begrudgingly agreed, even though all I wanted to do on the weekend was chill out, mostly because I didn’t have any excuse to say no.

The weather on Sunday was terrible, I really was not in the mood for polo, even though it was an indoor comp, any climatic condition doesn’t exactly make polo interesting. Then I was told we only had four players; Either we had to try and convince a B-team player to stay on from their morning games, or play a man down against teams better than us. Luckily on arrival Morgan Williams agreed to stay on, which was a gain for us and a massive call from him.

So with my new Nikon D3200 I got into my photographer mindset. Unfortunately I’m none the wiser as to what I am doing with a DSLR, so a few of the photos came out dark, and some blurred. However the majority of the blog will be photos, and mostly of the Aberfan team, due to the fact that they were playing every other game, and I couldn’t exactly photograph our team! What the team, and the blog, ideally need is a chump to come along and take photos for us, but until that happens I will be fulfilling the chump roll.

The first game we had was against Bareforrest, and they gave us a decent pasting. I would attempt to give more detail, but really when it came down to it, they just scored a lot, and we didn’t.

Avon B was second, and this was a game that we could win. Playing reasonably well in the first half, I believe we were up. Yet in the second half we were playing as though it was still a draw, and with a break on us, Avon managed to get the goal for a draw. But it didn’t stop there, with Avon getting yet another goal to take the score in their favour by one. This was a disappointing loss, as we were playing as though we should have won.

With Cherwell as our third game, we were expecting a similar defeat as we saw against Bareforrest, but in the first couple minutes we scored. We played exceptionally well in the first half, getting to half time at 2-2. This was good, but our tiredness showed in the second half, and the final score was 4-2.

By this time Morgan was showing signs of physical and emotional drainage, which after an 08:00 start and 8 games under his belt I can understand why. With Aberfan next it wasn’t as though it was going to get easier. A 7-1 loss ensued, and getting a goal against them was enough of a victory for me.

The final game was Penzance, which is one that we could actually win. We played well, but there was a distinct lack of energy in the game. I cannot remember the score, but it was a Cardiff Victory, which meant we came 5^th out of 6 during the day.

Now for some photos:

Cardiff B's rocking it

Cherwell putting on the pace

Cherwell vs. Avon B sprint

Aberfan vs. Bareforest sprint

Elan Winter putting on the pace

Aberfan with the ball

Elan Winter avoiding being pushed over (crafty)

Rob Lineham with fast hands (Too fast for my camera, unless I unwittingly put on some slower shutter speed)

Welsh League Finals

The Welsh League is normally over and done with by May or June, but this year the weather was so bad that the final weekend had to be called off and rearranged for September.  Cardiff A went into it mid-table having played remarkably average in the first 2 tournaments.  I wasn’t at the earlier tournaments but this is what I was told.  

The Uni, on the other hand, went into the tournament bottom of the league, but this was because they couldn’t make the previous 2 tournaments due to exams and other student stuff, so they hadn’t played any games yet.  This meant they were going to have to play every team twice this weekend, so they had 10 games on and off the whole day!  They were going to be more tired than a Mexican who had just finished his first day of work.

Cardiff B were looking for promotion and had brought along their internation Iranian ringer to help them out...  With him in their team would have probably beaten the A team, but they didn't want to swap any player around just to make sure they were promoted.

They won their first game 20-0.  A score which was embarrassing more for them than the team they were playing against.  

This photo is Rob beating a Cardiff Uni girl in the sprint, but it looks pretty close.  The girls were all just too excited about the Iranians abs to care about the score!  It is a different class of polo player who does push ups between the games...

We had to play Rhonda A, Aberfan A and B, Cardiff Uni twice and Dragon.  Straight away it was obvious that the weekend had clashed with another event, as the teams we were due to play would have struggled in the baby leagues.  It felt like a waste of time even turning up, but if we aren’t going to support the local league then who will?

The day was looking pretty standard, we had our first game with the uni, which we won fairly easily, we had a fiery game against Rhonda, where we were accused of cheating many times!  This wasn’t the case, we were just poor and they were worse, but we ended up winning.  We then played the Aberfan teams which were the hardest games of the day but we won both.  

It all kicked off in our second game against the Uni, they decided that they didn’t want to play fair and pushed me over into an oncoming boat.  One dislocated shoulder later and they manage to scrape a draw against us.  This called for a short but exciting trip to A&E with Helen behind the wheel of my car.  Bearing in mind she hadn’t driven a manual car since the day she passed her test, I was fairly happy with just the one stall on the way there.

I found out later that we came third overall so I should get a sweet medal.  The B’s won the league and got promoted, so it should be fun next year playing against them!