 Water polo history: from the invention to the Olympic water polo
Added: 01/16/2006 |
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Today water polo is one of the most popular team water games included into the Olympic game program. Today the game consists of four times that depend on game level. The water polo history details are still not discovered. But no doubt it was invented in England and took rugby and soccer essence as the basis. Today?s polo rules trace to Scottish variant of water polo.
Water polo is considered to be one of the most enigmatic kinds of sports as there are very little development documentations and some historical facts are very ambiguous. But anyway all traces of the history lead to the water powers of the 19th century England. This water play was partly copied and still represents an allusion version of rugby that is originated as well in England.
The game?s name inherited its origin from Indian word ?pulu?, that means ?balls? in all their variants. The first used ball presented a little rubber inflated ball. That was London Swimming Association that gave a birth to water polo in 1870 designing a set of common rules for indoor variant of water polo. This event predetermined future Olympic water polo.
The first model of this game was entirely different one from the modern that represents water polo at the Olympics. The game purpose was scoring the ball by planting it to the end of the pool using both hands. There were even some traditional tricks during the game performance that are sure not available at present time in Olympic water polo: a player could place little rubber ball into his swimming suit and swim under the water as long as it was possible reaching in this way the purpose. Today the rules are very free in the case of strategy choice.
The essence of the water polo (maximum close to the variant of modern Olympic water polo) was changed in Scotland. Since the glorious time of the changes the core of the game was based on swimming (this game component is one of the most important key element), speed - passing. The rules Scottish polo was developed from the rugby and soccer rules? set. Finally, the goal got its legal place 10x3 feet cage. The ball since that time was replaced by the leather one borrowed from the soccer and rugby could be thrown to the cage. Also new rules prohibited to keep the ball under the water. The fact was that water polo matches often ended with the underwater wrestling and unconsciousness of some players.
The USA variant of water polo resembling American football was first played in 1888. The USA became the place that gave a proof of future incredible popularity of this game by attracting more than 14, 000 spectators during the National Championship Games.
In the end of 19th century water polo in its Scottish variant gained extern popularity in main European countries: Germany, France, Belgium, Hungry and Austria. It seems that today everyone knows that water polo is a part of Olympic program. But the information that Olympic water polo became the first sport team game (1900) is not so wide-spread.
Modern water polo consists of four periods, their duration depends on game level (8, 7, 6 and 5 minutes). Today the most famous and notable Olympic water polo players and winners are representatives from European teams. The USA is the only one exception of European set that has significant results in Olympic water polo. It has one gold, some silver and bronze medals in its stock. Also Australia is notable for its victory in the first women?s water polo game.
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