Water polo is a team water sport, which can be best described as a combination of swimming, football (soccer), basketball, ice hockey, rugby and wrestling. A team consists of six field players and one goalkeeper. The goal of the game resembles that of football/soccer to score as many goals as possible, each goal being worth one point.

A perfect water polo athlete can be best described as having the over-arm accuracy of a baseball pitcher, the vertical of a volleyball player, the toughness of a hockey player, the endurance of a cross-country skier and the strategy of a chess player. Of course, to find a player of this ability is difficult.

Origin of the game

Although modern water polo was invented in the late nineteenth century in Great Britain by William Wilson, the game resembles an early African rite of passage into manhood played in rivers (often at the end the river was stained red with blood). Evidence suggests similar water-ball games developed independently in flooded rice paddies in western China sometime after 500 BC during the Zhou Dynasty. The modern game originated as a form of rugby football played in rivers and lakes in England and Scotland with a ball constructed of Indian rubber. Some authors claim that this "water rugby" came to be called "water polo" based on the English pronunciation of the Balti word for ball, pulu. Early play allowed brute strength, wrestling and holding opposing players underwater to recover the ball; the goalie stood outside the playing area and defended the goal by jumping in on any opponent attempting to score by placing the ball on the deck. By the 1880's, the game evolved to include fast-paced team play with a soccer-sized ball that emphasized swimming, passing, and scoring by shooting into a goal net; players could only be tackled when holding the ball and could not be taken under water. Water polo is now played in many countries around the world, notably Hungary and the former Yugoslavia. The present-day game involves teams of seven players (plus up to six substitutes), with a ball similar in size to a soccer ball but constructed of waterproof nylon.

Olympic competition

Men's water polo at the Olympics was the among the first team sports introduced at the 1900 games (along with cricket, rugby, football (soccer), polo (with horses), rowing and tug of war). Women's water polo became an Olympic sport at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games after political protests from the Australian women's team. Such protests were rewarded when Australia won the gold medal match against the United States with a "buzzer-beater" last-minute goal, taken from the half-way line. Deszo Gyarmati of Hungary won water polo medals at five successive Olympic Games (gold 1952, 1956, 1964; silver 1948; bronze 1960), a record that has never been matched.

The most famous water polo match in history is probably the 1956 Summer Olympics semi-final match between Hungary and the Soviet Union. As the athletes left for the games, the 1956 Hungarian revolution began, and a 200,000 strong Soviet army crushed a small uprising of Hungarian insurgents. Many of the Hungarian athletes vowed never to return home, and felt their only means of fighting back was by victory in the pool. The confrontation was the most bloody and violent water polo game in history, in which the pool reputedly turned red from blood. The Hungarians defeated the Soviets 4-0 before the game was called off in the final minute to prevent angry Hungarians in the crowd reacting to Valentin Prokopov punching Ervin Zador's eye open. The Hungarians went on to win the Olympic gold medal by defeating Yugoslavia 2-1 in the final. Half of the Hungarian Olympic delegation defected after the games.

Discipline's origin

Water polo was developed in Europe and the United States as two separate sports. In the United States it was termed softball water polo, with the ball being an unfilled bladder. The sport was very rough, often degenerating into numerous fights. In 1897, Harold Reeder of New York formulated the first American rules for the discipline, which were aimed at decreasing the excessive roughness of the game. The game is called water polo because players initially rode on floating barrels that resembled mock horses, and swung at the ball with mallet-like sticks, similar to those used in equestrian polo.

International play

Water polo world championships are held every year together with the world swimming championship, under the auspices of FINA. In 2002, FINA organized the sport's first international league, the Water Polo World League, in which the world’s best teams compete against one another in an annual season format with nearly half a million dollar purse.

Internationally, the biggest waterpolo competition in the world is played in the Netherlands. Prince William of England was the captain of his collegiate water polo team at St Andrew's University, Scotland. The annual Varsity Match between Oxford and Cambridge Universities is the sport's longest running rivalry, first played in 1891.