De Paddel Report

Following almost two days of travel the NZ Paddle Ferns arrived in Ieper (Ypres) Belgium ready to take on the World in the De Paddel competition.  De Paddle is a competition attended by international and club teams alike, held across two days with eight polo pitches running at once.  The tournament was the first chance for the Paddle Ferns to come together as a team and face some of the top teams in the world.   The Netherlands, Italy, French U21’s and a Dutch club team were all in the teams pool.   Given the number of teams and pitches running, the turn around between games was pretty tight but four wins from four games saw the Paddle Ferns sitting comfortably at the top of their pool following the first day of play.

First up on Sunday, the Paddle Ferns had a top of the pool clash with Australia (they had topped their pool of France, Canada, NZ U21’s and Great Britain U21’s).  The winner would have smoother sailing to the final with less games to play, the loser having to work harder to get there with more games to play.  A slow start to the game saw the Paddle Ferns trail 1 – nil at half time.  Picking it up, the Paddle Ferns managed to pull the game back to 1 -1 at full time.  De Paddel is a unique competition that sees a penalty shootout decide the game (instead of the standard golden goal extra time).  Following the first round of five shots at goal the teams were tied at 2 a piece, with Olivia Spencer-Bower and Erin Bolton slotting their shots impressively.  The game then advanced to a golden goal shootout with the Paddle Ferns shooting first.  Despite an impressive game in goal by Kate Bolton, the Australians were successful in their final attempt and won the game with the last shot by their captain finding its way past her paddle.

With limited time to prepare before their next game against France, the Paddle Ferns were unable to pick their game up and suffered another disappointing loss.  This meant the team had one last lifeline to make it to the semi finals.  Playing the Italians in what was ultimately the bronze medal match (the winner advancing through to a semi final against Australia and the loser playing off for fourth and fifth), the Paddle Ferns fired on all cylinders and won comfortably. 

Unfortunately the Paddle Ferns went down in their semi final against the Australians, but third place in their first international tournament as a team and still suffering the effects of jetlag after arriving in Europe two days earlier is still an impressive result.

A week of training still based in Ieper ahead of a tournament in Ghent, Belgium is underway.  Following that tournament, the team will head to the Netherlands to continue their build up to World Championships in Poznan, Poland on 5-9 September. 

De Paddel International

Our first competition is finished now and we finished up in third place. We had a really close game against the Aussies this morning finishing normal play with a draw 1 all. The game needed a result though and we had a penalty shoot out (De Paddel doesn't play extra time, it just goes straight to shoot outs). The first round of penalty shoot outs ended up with Ez and Liv slotting their goals and t

wo of the Aussies so were still at a tie. It went right to the end of a second round of sudden death penalty shots for the Aussies to nab the win by one goal. This meant we then had to play the French. Unfortunately Jet Lag was eating at us a little and we had a slow first half trailing at half time. The second half we came out firing and scored two goals and held the French scoreless. However two goals wasn't quite enough for the win. This then meant we went on to play the Italians. We beat them 5-3. Our next game was crunch time. We played against the Australians for a spot in the final. The team fought hard, but a mixture of heat and jet lag meant the Aussies took a win and we came third. We are happy with how the weekend went and were able to work on alot of things. It was a good result for a first international competition as a new NZ team.

We're looking forward to some hard training this week and then another competition this weekend at the Gekko International in Ghent.

De Paddel International Day One

The team has had a great day at the De Paddel International. They kicked off the day with a win against the Netherlands beating them 8-0. We followed this up with another win against the French U21 winning 5-1. For our third game we were onto the main pitch against a Dutch club team called MDR. We put them away 16-0! Our last game of the day was against the Italians. It was a dirty game filled with alot of Italian fouling, but we held our composure and won the game 3-1. We finished the day at the top of our pool and will now play Australia in the morning who were the top of their pool, but only by goal difference over the French and NZ U21's!!

Despite Jet Lag and 38 degrees temperatures today the team has been doing awesome and we can't wait to crack into it again tomorrow!

More results tomorrow!

PLAYER PROFILE: Emma Hicks #2.

Emmy-Lou is making her debut in the Paddle Ferns at this years World Championships. Emmy-Lou has come up through the ranks and burst into the Paddle Ferns with speed and power to burn. She's a passionate player and we can't wait to see her excel on the world stage.

In her spare time Emma is a volunteer Fire Officer in Levin. She's been doing that for five years which is awesome! Emma's hoping to join the Police Force in Feb next year.

Emma's passion for Canoe Polo is clear for all to see. She loves playing because of the aggression and the skill needed and because the people involved are like a second family to her.

GO EMMY-LOU!

PLAYER PROFILE: Kate Bolton #4

Kate made her debut for the Paddle Ferns at the Oceania Champs in 2009. Taking a year off to travel overseas she was back the following year to play at the 2011 Oceania Champs held in her home town of Palmerston North.

Kate is a dynamic goalie who helped the Palmerston North Valkyries dominate the National League Women's competition from 2009-2011, before switching to act as a player/coach for the Valkyries B team in order to help develop the sport.

She is presently studying for a Masters in Applied Social Work so she can promote change and social justice in her field of practice, which is currently youth justice.

Her aspirations for the future are to win a medal at the 2012 World Champs and to finish her Masters and continue working with at risk youth.

L-R Emma Hicks, Julie Bolton, Erin Bolton, Kate Bolton

Lets the Games Begin

Welcome to the 2012 World Championship Campaign of the New Zealand Paddle Ferns.

The team consists of 1. Erin Bolton, 2. Emma Hicks, 4. Kate Bolton, 5. Emma Matheson (vc), 6. Olivia Spencer-Bower, 7. Emma Hubbard, 8. Julie Bolton (c).

The team heads to Europe on the 16th of August. Flying into Paris the team will travel to Belgium and compete at De Paddel on the 18th and 19th of August. The following weekend they will compete at the Ghent International, also in Belguim. The team then makes their way over to Poland through Holland and Germany. The World Championships commence on the 5th of September and close with the finals on the 9th of September.

Visit our blog as the tour commences to keep up to date with the team. You can also visit our facebook page NZ Paddle Ferns.

We look forward to a great tour and World Championships!

GO KIWI