A day in the life of a Czech Woman

The annual Parmacup UWH tournament is now in its fourth year, attracting an ever higher standard of teams from all around Europe. Until this year Team Switzerland had had a 100% attendance record, but this year it was not to be, and it was a lone Martin who made his way down to Parma to join the Czech ladies team, which only had four players, although by the time tournament day came along, they had managed to convince two of the Czech men to go as well, so we were seven. Six in the water with one substitute, but sadly no subbing for Martin. Still, they had asked me to play as full back, so with the hot Italian sun beating down on me and four Czech ladies in swimsuits in front of me, it wasn't all bad.

The Czech Ladies, plus entourage, with Martin, far right

We started off against a French team making its first appearance at the tournament, the Grenoble ladies. It was a fairly even match, but we had a slight edge on brawn and managed to pull through to win 2-0.

Our next game, however, brought us back to reality with a bump, as we were pitched against Martin's former club in the UK, West London. And West London 1, no less, as they had also brought a second team. Brawn does not help if you can't get close enough to the puck to use it, and they ran rings around us to win a comfortable 5-0.

Our next game was against a team that we normally beat, but that gave us a very hard time to do it, the Munich Ladies. Normally very good in supporting each other, the team had a number of new players who were just finding their feet, and we ran out to an easy 6-0 victory.

Our last game of the first round was against Assetto Variabile from Bologna, the team that started underwater hockey in Italy. We knew from the scoresheet that it would be a close game as their results against the other teams had been very similar to ours. However, a lapse of concentration on our part in the first minutes of the game gave them a quick goal, which we were unable to pull back. Final result 1-0 to Assetto Variable and it was the lower division for us.

Our first game in the second division was against another new team making its first appearance at the Parmacup - the Baltic Seals from Poland. Although we outskilled them, they outbrawned us, and the referees didn't do a good enough job of emphasising the "non-contact" element of the game. Result: 3-2 to the Baltic Walruses.

We bounced back with a surprising 6-1 victory again Roma, who were definitely missing the unstoppable Marcone, a veteran of all but one of Team Switzerland's campaigns, but were then brought back down by another 5-0 defeat at the hands of the other West London team, West London 2. Team 1 and team 2 they may well have been, but if so, then we were certainly not good enough to be able to tell the difference!

Martin Reed, referee

Despite three good wins and two very narrow defeats, our losses had let us down, and we found ourselves playing against a "Belgium and friends" composite team, the "Beerbarians" for 13th/14th place. Martin had refereed their previous game against one of the other British teams, St Albans, but knowing who were the danger players and who to mark did not prevent them from doing their damage, and despite putting up a brave fight, we went down 4-1 to end up in 14th place.

Martin (front) with the Czech Ladies at the presentation

However, the dinner, party and dancing way into the night more than made up for any disappointment that we may have felt from our performance in the pool. Full credit once again to the Parmesan for another excellent tournament..

Martin Reed