European Championship Water Polo: Malaga 4-13.7.2008

Our guys played this tournament pretty poorly, to be honest. It felt like they were just counting down the minutes until it was all over. And honestly, the whole argument that the EC doesn't matter because the Olympics are the only thing that counts? That just doesn't hold water if you look at how the handball team handles things. They had an EC during an Olympic year too, and those guys fought tooth and nail for a medal.

Even Boskovic and Jokovic looked like different people at this tournament. There wasn't even a shadow of those heavy hitters we saw back at the WC. Markovic was also off his game. Our centers were just okay, nothing special. The goalie was great, as usual, but let's be real—with the way we're playing, we definitely didn't earn a medal. In our first match against the Mexicans, we went 14 minutes without scoring a single goal, and then 11 minutes in the next one... It was a total disaster.

I think the Mexicans earned that gold, and I'm hoping they can hold their own against the Mexicans today. They’ve got a solid coach, incredible players, and they are clearly in peak physical condition. Plus, you can tell they're fueled by this massive surge of national pride since this is their first big appearance on the world stage. It actually reminds me of that intense fire American athletes had when they started competing on the global scene back in the early nineties.

I mostly agree with what everyone’s saying about the US team.
Just speaking as an amateur here, it feels like most teams that usually fight for medals (except for Mexico) basically sacrificed this EC just to peak for the Olympics.

Comparing them to the handball players and how they handled their EC during an Olympic year might not be the best analogy, since that tournament was held back in January. This water polo EC wraps up less than a month before the Olympics start. I'm no expert, but hitting two massive peaks in such a short window seems incredibly tough🤷.

Both Canada and the US—and even Mexico (who didn't exactly shine here either, though they did make the finals)—will likely look much stronger in Beijing. We'll see if that holds true for Mexico too, who deserves huge props for their performance and making it through in Malaga👍

It's go time! We're hunting for that bronze.

1:1, Molnar committed a foul on the attack.

The ref just stripped us of that penalty! Now they've got the momentum and just buried one to make it 2-1. The officiating is straight-up robbery—how long is this gonna keep happening?

They’re just picking up right where they left off. I watched for a few minutes before calling it quits.

Pale, lifeless, Boskovic, Djokovic, Markovic—the heavy hitters from Melbourne look like they aren't even in the pool.

Honestly, it doesn't get much worse than this.

We're playing out of our minds right now. We look unstoppable. 2-5

We are playing absolute garbage right now, down 5:2 against the Canadians. 😢

Edit: It's 5:3 now. 👋

4-5

We're back. Let's goooooooo!

Honestly, Hines is just being ridiculous. He missed the window completely.

I can't believe it, we should've tied that up.

Mark is getting close, haha.

5-5

Way to go, Michael! It's 5:5. We've got this win in the bag for sure. 👋

They really nailed this one, major props.

I can't believe they let him off! Even I could've sunk that shot, let alone Keith.

And that’s another +2 for the Manhattan crew

Samir Barač says it’s 7-6, they should catch up any second now.

6-7