Legendary golden water polo team of Hungary is back! – FINA Masters – Budapest2017

One of the most eagerly awaited event of the 17th FINA Masters World Championships will be the water polo 40+ tournament. This category will feature several players of the legendary golden water polo team of Hungary, including three, two and one-time Olympic champions. The motivation is already high, the experience will most definitely be remarkable in the water and in the stands alike.

Shortly after the agreement was signed on Budapest hosting the 2017 FINA World Championships and the following Masters World Championships the eyes of Tamás Kásás, three-time Olympic champion alighted. The legendary water polo player -member of the national team earning the Olympic champion title in 2000, 2004 and 2008- is the only member of the previous team who is not engaged in this discipline any more hence it is even more surprising that he was the one to initiate the reunion of the „good old team”.

Sometimes we could see some occasions when they played together again, they last reunited in 2016 autumn for the farewell gala match of Péter Biros in Eger. Back then they all knew that they would soon be preparing for a new challenge. The previous months have seen intense communication and enthusiastic preparation by the team.

Here is the list of players who have registered for the Masters WCH so far:

Tibor Benedek, Péter Biros, Rajmund Fodor, István Gergely, Tamás Kásás, dr. Gergely Kiss, Tamás Märcz, dr. Tamás Molnár, dr. Barnabás Steinmetz, Zoltán Szécsi, Bulcsú Székely, Tamás Varga, Zsolt Varga, Attila Vári. Coaches: dr. Dénes Kemény, Zoltán Kósz

Tamás Märcz will definitely have a busy summer as he is the head coach of the hosting national team preparing for the elite world championships and afterwards he will enter the pool as a member of the team called Millenium in the Masters.

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„We have been dealing with this opportunity for months, so it did not just bounce off our heads. We had several reasons to enter the tournament, the most important thing is that Budapest is to host the Masters WCH so we can play again in front of our own audience. For another thing, we are now part of the 40+ age group, we have matured. Gala matches we have played together lately have also given us a boost. These include for instance the gala in Eger or Debrecen, organised by Tamás Varga earlier. These are nice experiences from the recent past. Although most of us are not active players any more, it was not so long ago when we were, so we can get back in shape relatively fast” – said the center player of the squad claiming gold in Sydney.

As a matter of fact, from the list above it is only Gergely Kiss, who is still an active player, Barnabás Steinmetz played in Honvéd team back in the early season while Zoltán Szécsi enter the pool every now and then as the player-coach of Kaposvár to prove his skills as a goalie – all the others have retired from the sport already.