Norbert Madaras remains President of the Hungarian Water Polo Federation for another four years
The Hungarian Water Polo Federation held its election congress, where delegates re-elected Norbert Madaras as president for another four years. Over the past two years, the Olympic champion leading the sport presented a sport development strategy that will define the future of Hungarian water polo until 2032, which was unanimously supported by the assembly.
The congress began with Norbert Madaras's presidential report, summarizing his two years in office.
"I suspected that this would be a challenging task, and in a sense, it has become the most challenging task of my life so far, but you see, I smile, because I love challenges, and I believe that many good things have happened to us since November 2022," Norbert Madaras began his presentation.
The president recalled that after his election, the financial situation of the federation was stabilized, and in terms of achievements in the pool, he pointed out that in recent times the national teams have achieved outstanding results at world championships - the men won gold in 2023, and the women won silver in 2024 - however, there was a feeling of disappointment regarding the Olympic performance. Madaras Norbert added that the youth national teams had an unprecedented run, being the only ones in the world to reach the top four in all six age-group World and European Championships in 2023 and 2024, with the young athletes winning four gold medals last year in a unique fashion, followed by the men's U18 team becoming world champions this year, and five teams winning medals just like the previous year.
Regarding the future, the president outlined several serious plans: the MVLSZ Health and Methodological Center has already started operating at the Dagály area, the installation of cameras has begun which will allow all matches under the MVLSZ to be followed on the federation's specially developed video platform within a few years, and the preparation of professional materials - in the form of books and instructional videos - is well underway to make youth player training and development more effective than ever. "In addition, we aim to be at the forefront of the widespread application of artificial intelligence-based performance and game analysis systems," Norbert Madaras mentioned a significant perspective.
All of this led to the presentation of the MVLSZ long-term sports development strategy for 2024-2032, which is based on four pillars: sustainability, youth development, improving performance, and increasing the popularity of water polo. As Norbert Madaras put it at the beginning of the strategy presentation: "It is necessary to achieve the systematic development of the sports industry, the generalization of health and performance diagnostics, an increase in the number of sports professionals and the continuous improvement of their knowledge. This must be combined with organizational and infrastructural developments, one of the foundations being the continuous adaptation of the financing model."
The president stated that it is even more important to broaden and deepen the foundation of the sport. "Our main goal is to attract even more young people to water polo, which is essential to maintain and even increase its current popularity. We aim to achieve all this in the upcoming two Olympic cycles, and I am convinced: the foundations remain solid, from which we will start anew, and yes, we will once again find the path to victory."
The delegates unanimously accepted both the presidential report and the strategy, and then the election of the president and the board followed. Norbert Madaras was unanimously elected as president by the general assembly, now entrusted with a full Olympic cycle as president. Beck György will remain the co-president of the organization, Gergely István, the nominee of the league, and Molnár Tamás, the head of the Water Polo Committee of the World Aquatics, have been elected as vice presidents. Representing the league in the board are Biros Péter and Tóth Sándor, representing the Professional Body is Kovács István, representing the Regional League is Lukács Gergely, and from the Youth and Sports Committee is Székely Bulcsú, as well as the National Sportsman, Tamás Faragó. In addition, the delegates voted to trust Dala Tamás, Zantleitner Krisztina, Nyíri Zoltán, Lovas Péter, and Kis Gábor.
As for other positions, Éva Hegedüs was once again appointed as the Social President of MVLSZ, Sándor Kállai leads the Audit Committee as chairman, with Auth Róbert and Nagy Viktória as members.
