Late sport Water polo board upset at selection

Press, 2 April 1980, Page 6

Late sport Water polo board upset at selection

Weaker teams appear to have been favoured ahead of New Zealand for the. Olympic Games water-polo elimination series in Sofia, Bulgaria from April 28 to May 4. The chairman of the New Zealand Water Polo Board (Mr G. S. Brockett) told the council of the New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association last evening that he had been informed in Australia at the week-end that three teams had withdrawn from the 12-nation elimination. . . . He said, that the three teams chosen as replacements were - all apparently inferior to New ZeS; land. One was Puerto Rico, another China, and he did not know the third. He requested that the N.Z.A.S.A. write to F.LN.A. (the international governing bodv of swimming) to ascertain if . the information was correct, and if it was, had New Zealand been considered as one of the three replacements. And if it had: not been considered, why not? Tony Keenan, the coach of the Commonwealth Games champion, Rebecca Perrott, was ap-

pointed coach of the New Zealand swimming team to the Moscow Olympics. Mr Keenan was favoured for the position after the resignation because of ill health of Bob Mclntyre from Auckland. Cyril Buske, from the Bay of Plenty, a former Commonwealth Games diver, was appointed diving coach for the Olympics. The New Zealand swimming championships mav be held a month earlier next year. The Bay of Plenty centre, which will stage the carnival in an outdoor pool at Rotorua, has suggested it -be the week after, the New Zealand age-group ships in Fielding, in midFebruary. -Their reasons for the change are that it will cut costs, particularly for South Island swimI mere who will not have to make a second trip to the North Island, and the weather should be more stable in February. - The swimming sub-committee of the council and the N4w Zealand Swimming Coaches Assocb ; ation will discuss the proposaj i before a decision is made Inext month’s council meetiagftj