London 2012: Water polo progress report

Podium athletes None Development athletes 30 UK Sport Mission 2012 progress rating Amber Joanna Wray, world class programmes manager: In the past year we have … won the women's European B Nations Trophy and come fourth in the men's, exceeding our targets. We failed to qualify for the A Championships but learned from the experience. The women beat Germany and Italy for the first time in many years. In the next two years we will ... start the women playing in the first division in Hungary, a brilliant way to get top-level play during our normally quiet months. We will also have up to 15 men in first division clubs around Europe. Two innovative ways to accelerate our progression to 2012 Medal tally prediction ... Hard to predict as the top teams regularly beat and lose against each other. Our main target is for both our squads to play competitively against all countries. The women have a better chance as they are ranked seventh in Europe and there are eight teams in the Olympics. The men have 12 teams and men's water polo is professional in many countries, but we are progressing fast.