‘Promising’ team named for Women’s European Junior Water Polo Champs

A ‘strong and promising’ cohort of 15 water polo players has been selected to represent Great Britain at the LEN Women’s European Junior Water Polo Championships in Croatia.

The team of U17 athletes is led by captain and Otter athlete, Lucy-Mail Helliwell, and will travel to Šibenik next month to compete against the best teams that Europe has to offer.

Rachel Bayley, Swim England head of performance operations and team leader for the trip, said: “This is an extremely strong and promising squad of athletes and we are looking forward to seeing them return to competition next month.

“The team returned to training in May and has remained completely committed to their sport over the last 12 months during spells of lockdown.

“They took the challenges put to them in their stride and adapted to a new way of training – from zoom meetings to personal home training and where possible, swimming with their clubs.”

The team has been drawn in Group A meaning they will compete against Spain, Serbia, Israel and the Czech Republic. Spain was the winner of the 2019 edition of the event after they won 12-11 against Russia in the gold medal match.

This year’s competition will take place from 21-29 August, with the team travelling to Croatia on 18 August for a brief pre-competition training camp.