Ponds Forge hosts weekend of learning and development at Water Polo Talent Games
The Swim England Water Polo Talent Games return this weekend as up and coming water polo players head to Ponds Forge for a weekend of learning and development.
Now in its third year, the Talent Games bring together players from each of the six Swim England Water Polo Talent Centres together to compete against one another in full matches under World Aquatics conditions.
As well as that, the first Talent Games of the year has education at its heart. Players will take part in three workshops (one in pool and two classroom).
The classroom workshops will be run by Kerrie Slevin from Swim England’s DiSE team and former Great Britain coach and the Institute of Swimming’s lead water polo tutor, Sarah Dunsbee.
Kerrie will be running a workshop on the optimum athlete development framework (OADF), looking at what makes a good person, athlete and performer whilst Sarah will lead a workshop on the specific player characteristics needed to succeed in water polo.
The coaches will join the players for the pool side workshop working with Tim Dunsbee (Great Britain’s Senior Men’s head coach) who is leading the open sessions and Phil Powell (former GB coach and current Head Coach of Midlands Talent Centre) who will be leading the female sessions.
Refining skills and building confidence
It’s also the first Talent Games event for the new Midlands centre, based at the Alan Higgs Centre in Coventry, giving more players the opportunity to grow and develop their skills.
They’ll be looking to pick up victories in the head-to-head matches as the battle to become this year’s Talent Centre champions gets underway in Sheffield.
Last year, the East centre took three of the four titles that are contested over the U14 and U16 age groups.
This weekend, each team will play the first half of their matches in their respective competitions as they gain more high-level match experience to help prepare them for future international events.
The remainder of the talent centre matches will be held at the Summer Talent Games on Saturday 21 and Sunday 22 June, where this year’s winners will be decided.
If you can’t make it to Ponds Forge, you can follow all the results from the weekend with our live scoreboard.
Speaking ahead of the first Games of 2025 this weekend, Swim England Water Polo Talent and Inclusion Officer, Andy McGinty, is looking forward to seeing each of the talent centres come back together in South Yorkshire.
He said: “We’re really looking forward to having all six talent centres under the same roof for the first time this weekend.
“The first Talent Games of the year is always really exciting as we can see both the new players to the programme and the development of those that were with us last year.
“As always, the true focus of the Games is on player development rather than the results themselves, so we really hope that both the workshops and matches this weekend help each of our athletes refine their skills and build their confidence for the future.”
If you want to attend this weekend’s event in Sheffield, spectator tickets are available to purchase here.
