What a great weekend of Intermediate Water Polo.

Over the last weekend in Auckland the Year 7 & 8 Winter Water Polo Festival was held.  The festival saw 33 teams from 23 different schools playing over 3 divisions and played at 4 venues (Westwave, Epsom Aquatic Centre, Diocesan Aquatic Centre and the Sacred Heart Aquatic Centre) with St Kentigern School winning the overall open title making it their first time in the history of Year 7&8 water polo that the school has won a major tournament. Diocesan Red continued their previous history of successes by taking the girls title.

The winners in each division were:

Open A Grade: 1st -  St Kentigern School A;  2nd - Murrays Bay B;  3rd - Sacred Sharks
The Most Valuable Player was Callum de Jager - St Kentigern School A
Outstanding Players were - Matt Morris - Murrays Bay A, Matt Dell - Sacred Sharks, Bernie Doyle - Murrays Bay B and Ben Fleming - St Kentigern School A

Open B Grade: 1st - St Peters A;  2nd – Waikowhai; 3rd - Blockhouse Bay
The Most Valuable Player was Daniel Cameron - St Peters A

Girls Grade: 1st - Diocesan Red;  2nd - St Marys A;  3rd - St Cuthberts. 
The Most Valuable Player was Selena Waru-Benson - Diocesan Red
Outstanding Players were - Iutita Evans - St Marys A, and Caitlan Allan - St Cuthberts

The tournament is held as a fundraiser for the Mens programme and in particular for the Youth Men who are preparing to attend along with the NZ Water Polo Youth Womens team the 1st FINA World Youth Water Polo Championships 2012, which is being held in Perth Australia during December this year.

It was great to see 3 members of the NZ Water Polo Junior Men’s team;  Anton Sunde, Thomas Kingsmill and Matt Lewis assisting with the running of the Winterfest .  They are such great inspiration to the intermediate players coming through.