Italy tunes up for the Olympics with a big men’s water polo tournament win

Rome: In the Mecca of water polo, the Hungarians hosted a mini tournament on the Margaret Island in Budapest, where Hungary, Italy, Japan and France came together to compete. The matches were exciting, with Italy winning the tournament with three wins.

The Domino Trans Water Polo Tournament was held in Budapest on Margaret Island, in the Hajos Alfred swimming pool, in the same pool where the 2017 and 2022 World Championships’ water polo matches were. Four teams with completely different playing styles met a perfect assessment for all of them to see how they are doing with the Olympic preparations.

The Italians were in excellent shape, playing a very strong and confident game, beating the French by three goals, the Hungarians by two goals and the Japanese by one goal. Alessandro Campagna, the head coach of the Italian men’s water polo team, said that they have done a good job so far, but there is still room for improvement: “This preparation was very difficult, not only for Italy, but for all the teams, because there were too many games during this season – European Championship, World Championships, National club season, Champions League season. I think the players had more than 80 games only in 2024. At the beginning of the preparation the players looked extremely tired. Day by day we have to change something, we have to adapt to their form, to their mood. I think we have done a good job so far.”

Because of this fatigue, one might wonder if the Italians will arrive at the Olympics tired, but Campagna reassured 7bello fans that there will be no problem as they will do everything they can to win and resilience will be the key: “The qualifying teams are almost at the same level, you can lose in any way – if you are tired or not. Against France, Japan, Australia, the USA, or even against Romania you can easily lose your match if you do not play 100%. If you play in a lazy way even in the group stage, you risk losing your match, not just one, maybe more. That’s why it’s important to be ready for all eight matches, both physically and mentally.”

With this mentality and play, the Italians are certainly a force to be reckoned with, and there is a good chance that the Italian team could go all the way to the final, as Campagna underlined: „ The first step is to get through the group stage, where we have to play against world champion Croatia, and I think there are 4-5 teams that are very strong opponents. Our main goal is to win a medal. Our dream is to stand on the podium in Paris.”

One thing is for sure, it will not be easy to beat the Italians in Paris, but it will not be easy to beat the Hungarians, the world champions of Fukuoka. Zsolt Varga, the Hungarian team’s head coach, said that: “We had very serious pre-season period, with a lot of hard trainings and a lot of swimming, our players have just started to practice tactical elements, and the main goal of the tournament in Margaret Island was to find the rhythm of the game. We’re going to train with the Italians for another week after this tournament, so I’m confident that their improved shape will bring us up to their level a little bit.”

It was also interesting to see how the Japanese played, as their unique style of water polo always produces surprising results. Zsolt Varga was also happy to test his team against a completely different water polo: “The Japanese style of play can be very dangerous, as they can easily get counterattacks and use their positional advantage very well. They’ve also absorbed the European style of water polo and combined that with their own game, they’re already excellent shooters.”

The Japanese finally beat the French by one goal, leading throughout the game and tiring in the last quarter, but the French’s big run was not enough to win. Japan head coach Yoshinori Shiota said that they had only been preparing for the Olympics for a little over a month, but that the tournament was an excellent opportunity to test themselves against stronger teams: “This is a great opportunity to play against stronger teams during this mini tournament. Our strong point is the counterattack, so we try to play a unique defense and make a lot of contact. Against European teams it’s more difficult for us because we try to play in a European style, we have very fast players and we try to take advantage of that.”

The Japanese team should not be underestimated, their goal at the Olympics is to advance from the group stage: “We would like to win two or three games, probably the most important games will be our first one, against Serbia, and the next one, against France. Our goal is to finish in the top eight,” says Yoshinori Shiota.