NSWIS selections in Australia U20 water polo team builds on squad’s success

New South Wales Institute of Sport (NSWIS) will be represented by six scholarship athletes in the Australian Women’s 20&U team that will contest the World Aquatics U20 Water Polo Championships in Portugal from 8-15 September 2023.

Sienna Green, Samantha Hardingham, Samantha Henderson, Jasmine Higgs, Anneliese Pamp, Layla Smith were named in the 15 player team.

Australian Head Coach, Jo Clark, said the team is looking forward to testing themselves against the world’s best.

“It’s an exciting opportunity for these athletes to be attending the U20 World Championships after a challenging period for their age group,” Clark said.

“Competing on the world stage is a significant milestone in their sporting careers, allowing them to showcase their talents and represent our country with pride.

“After the previous setback of not being able to send a team to the last World Championships due to COVID-19, this opportunity presents a chance for redemption and a showcase of the team’s resilience and hard work over the past three years.

“The team’s goal for the World Championships are to achieve a podium finish, and this goal reflects the team’s determination to excel for Australia in the tournament.

“I want to commend all the athletes who participated in our rigorous selection process. The talent and effort displayed were truly exceptional, making the final squad decisions incredibly difficult.

“Every squad member and those who narrowly missed out should be proud of their accomplishments.”

The selection of the NSWIS scholarship athletes to compete in the Under 20 World Cup follows the seven squad mates – Zoe Arancini, Pascalle Casey, Bronte Halligan (photographed), Ruby Swadling, Tilly Kearns, Genevieve Longman and Amy Ridge – being picked to represent Australia’s senior World Championships team, the Stingers, at the 2023 World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka, Japan, from July 14-30.

NSWIS Head Coach, Bec Rippon, said her players had benefited from their recent three weekends of tough water polo against Queensland, a combined Australia team and the Junior Aussies in a series of games played at Brisbane, Sydney and Canberra.

“The overall performance of the NSWIS squad over the three weekends of competition was excellent,” said Rippon. “We had a different squad each round which meant we definitely needed to ensure our focus remained on just a few important aspects of the team and to then build on them week by week.

“We were able to trial and review how we went in such areas as our warm up, nutrition, recovery, game analysis and to see the impact those things could have on individual and team performances.”

While pleased to have so many of the NSWIS squad selected for national duties, Rippon made special mention of some athletes.

“We had some great performances from all athletes across the three weekends,” said Rippon.

“Some of our young senior NSWIS athletes that really stepped up included Olivia Mitchell, Lilli Harris and Alexie Lambert. We also had many of our juniors (U/20) play well whether it was with NSWIS, AUS jnr or AUS combined teams.

“Other standout performers included Gen Longman in goals. She was a consistently high performer in the pool and a great leader out of the pool. It was also impressive seeing the return of players such as Bronte Halligan and Tilly Kearns for the last weekend of play.”