The people of Kostren won the Darko Brnjac Memorial
Water polo club Crikvenica, with the patronage of the City of Crikvenica, organized another tournament last Sunday in memory of our Darko Brnjac. The popular Spajk, as his friends called him, was a great proponent of the idea that a group of former CPK (Crikvenica Swimming Club) players headed by Goran Ježić (the first president of VK Crikvenica) should take over the fate of water polo in Crikvenica, establish and run the Crikvenica Water Polo Club.
Also, Darko Brnjac is responsible for founding the women's water polo club Primorje from Rijeka, as well as for acquiring a prominent role in the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County Water Polo Association. It can be said that Darko Brnjac has done great things for the development of Kvarner water polo, primarily as regards the development of young players.
The tournament is also significant for one more thing. Namely, this was an extraordinary opportunity for the premiere of the new water polo playground that our club received as a donation from the Croatian Water Polo Association. Valuable members of the Crikvenica Water Polo Club, on Saturday or the day before the tournament, assembled the water polo court that the club received from HVS based on the Decision on the allocation of water polo courts in 2024. It is a Malmsten playground measuring 28x20m. The Croatian Water Polo Association, in cooperation with the Croatian Olympic Committee, announced a competition called "New playgrounds for new Barracudas". The advantage was given to smaller clubs that demonstrate innovation, sustainability and a long-term vision of using the allocated playgrounds as primarily open swimming pools.
The tournament brought together 3 teams: Primorje EB, Jadran Kostrena and clearly the host Crikvenica. The following results were achieved:
Crikvenica – Jadran 6:11
Primorje EB – Jadran 5:13
Crikvenica – Primorje EB 11:5
Jadran from Kostrena is the winner of the tournament, while individual awards were won by - Toni Krolo (Jadran Kostrena - best goalkeeper), Filip Jurić (Jadran Kostrena - best scorer) and Bože Galić (Crikvenica - best player).
