This article was originally sent to & published at the Youth1.com media channel here.
This is the unusual story of a youth water polo club setting out to resurrect the sport after twenty-odd years of complete destruction in a city where it was once hugely successful and popular. They fought with financial and local administrative difficulties - but after just two years, they achieved on the international scene. Their recent past and present revealed a number of aspects that transcend geographical specifics and the material aspects of the equation that faced the coach & the kids when they started out.
Most of the internationally noted talent emigrated or gave up completely any hope of keeping the sport alive in that town. Nothing is more symbolic of the last two decades than the abandoned and disintegrating ruins of the 50m outdoors pool, which was once the place of two daily training sessions and countless matches during the summer months.
The local sports club Torpi, which started the water polo revival that began as a passionate dream of Razvan Paltineanu, has brought back the sport and later the youth water polo club Aquasport was formed. Lack of funding was just a part of their problems, as the lack of support from new administration was another huge obstacle when it came to vital access to several facilities that could have been used for training. The two-decade-long absence of water polo in the town's history certainly had an important negative role to play, as the last memories of what that sport meant to the local community were dating back to the 1980s...
For the new club, gaining access to one of the many indoors pools from autumn to spring had proven to be impossible at first - and this was only solved recently by an amicable offer from the local University sports association. Access to an outdoors pool was gained after much effort that attracted the good will of the city’s Mayor. The kids' usual routine was to get up at 5AM and train before school, then in summer, too, had two training sessions per day. The outdoors pool is promised to be covered this autumn, hence even more chances of a continuous training regime, which will greatly benefit them.
A water polo club in Oradea, a city where the lethal discontinuity of the sport didn’t occur, offered help with what we could call an exchange program, so they trained together, visiting their facilities and gaining match experience. Donations were received from here and there, so they could buy equipment and fund their travel to competitions.
The remarkable addition to the story is what they achieved under these circumstances since their beginnings.
After just two years of existence, the players born in 1995 and 1996 have managed to bring home in August 2011 the prestigious Turbo Cup from the Olympic Hopes tournament held at Szentes, Hungary, having won every match in this tournament that gathered more than fifty teams from around the world. The younger group (those born in 1997-1998) reached 4th place in their age group, which was also a huge achievement for the young club.
Right after this, in early September they brought home a silver medal from the Slovenski Water Polo international tournament, only losing 11-12 in the final where they faced the mighty Honved Budapest's youth team. The tournament's Most Valuable Player was selected from Aquasport, so it was yet another notable highlight in their career.
Networking for them is as important as all the other practical support, and in that spirit, their gradually emerging Facebook presence was established here.Their Youtube channel can be viewed here.
Wishing them best of luck and long series of continued successes can sound like a classic cliché. Same goes maybe for the statement that one is truly admiring their rare passion, determination and ambition. However, considering the demons of local history they had to overcome and their continued struggles with tangible obstacles of sometimes absurd nature, one really, truly means both statements.
This is the unusual story of a youth water polo club setting out to resurrect the sport after twenty-odd years of complete destruction in a city where it was once hugely successful and popular. They fought with financial and local administrative difficulties - but after just two years, they achieved on the international scene. Their recent past and present revealed a number of aspects that transcend geographical specifics and the material aspects of the equation that faced the coach & the kids when they started out.
The water polo club called Aquasport was established in 2011 in the town of Târgu Mures, in Transylvania, Romania. The sport had an extremely successful past in that city, and it was an organic part of everyday reality there, up until the 1989 Revolution. After the totalitarian regime was abolished, the most recent 20-odd years have brought various freedoms - but, somehow, also brought a total destruction of the sport. One could witness the former training bases fallen into total (and literal) ruin due to complete lack of interest & investment from the new local elite who were largely ignorant of the pre-1990 history of the city.
Most of the internationally noted talent emigrated or gave up completely any hope of keeping the sport alive in that town. Nothing is more symbolic of the last two decades than the abandoned and disintegrating ruins of the 50m outdoors pool, which was once the place of two daily training sessions and countless matches during the summer months.
The local sports club Torpi, which started the water polo revival that began as a passionate dream of Razvan Paltineanu, has brought back the sport and later the youth water polo club Aquasport was formed. Lack of funding was just a part of their problems, as the lack of support from new administration was another huge obstacle when it came to vital access to several facilities that could have been used for training. The two-decade-long absence of water polo in the town's history certainly had an important negative role to play, as the last memories of what that sport meant to the local community were dating back to the 1980s...
For the new club, gaining access to one of the many indoors pools from autumn to spring had proven to be impossible at first - and this was only solved recently by an amicable offer from the local University sports association. Access to an outdoors pool was gained after much effort that attracted the good will of the city’s Mayor. The kids' usual routine was to get up at 5AM and train before school, then in summer, too, had two training sessions per day. The outdoors pool is promised to be covered this autumn, hence even more chances of a continuous training regime, which will greatly benefit them.
A water polo club in Oradea, a city where the lethal discontinuity of the sport didn’t occur, offered help with what we could call an exchange program, so they trained together, visiting their facilities and gaining match experience. Donations were received from here and there, so they could buy equipment and fund their travel to competitions.
The remarkable addition to the story is what they achieved under these circumstances since their beginnings.
After just two years of existence, the players born in 1995 and 1996 have managed to bring home in August 2011 the prestigious Turbo Cup from the Olympic Hopes tournament held at Szentes, Hungary, having won every match in this tournament that gathered more than fifty teams from around the world. The younger group (those born in 1997-1998) reached 4th place in their age group, which was also a huge achievement for the young club.Right after this, in early September they brought home a silver medal from the Slovenski Water Polo international tournament, only losing 11-12 in the final where they faced the mighty Honved Budapest's youth team. The tournament's Most Valuable Player was selected from Aquasport, so it was yet another notable highlight in their career.
Networking for them is as important as all the other practical support, and in that spirit, their gradually emerging Facebook presence was established here.Their Youtube channel can be viewed here.
Wishing them best of luck and long series of continued successes can sound like a classic cliché. Same goes maybe for the statement that one is truly admiring their rare passion, determination and ambition. However, considering the demons of local history they had to overcome and their continued struggles with tangible obstacles of sometimes absurd nature, one really, truly means both statements.
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