Duo’s Stirling show of force at Euro Cup

STIRLING High School star water polo players Hanna Muller and Chloe Meecham won a silver medal with the SA women’s team at the European Union Nations Women’s Water Polo Cup, in Pilsen, Czech Republic last month.

Muller and Meecham were an integral part of the team that made it to the final of the competition where they unfortunately went down 12-6 to England for their first loss, which saw them end as runners-up.

“I think before we arrived there we had little expectation of where we would place as we are very young and had not played together previously,” explained Muller.

“After our first couple of games we played really well together and we realised we could be competitive. So we were happy to get silver, we could have won the final but silly errors and exhaustion crept into our game.”

It was an especially profitable tournament for Muller, who was the youngest player in the team at age 17 and she finished as the teams top goalscorer as well as the second highest goalscorer in the competition with 22 goals in five games, just two off the top spot.

“I was happy to finish as top goalscorer for the team but it wasn’t my focus, and my team assisted me in achieving this,” said Muller.

“I just wanted to prove that I deserved my place in the team, because I was the youngest in the team, and for the team to do well.”

In the event the SA women’s team got their campaign off to the perfect start when they kicked off the tournament with a powerful 263 drubbing of Wales, with Muller scoring nine times in the match.

Their second game was a much tighter affair and needed the team to dig deep before eventually emerging with a tight 11-9 win over Slovakia, with two goals from Muller and one from Meecham helping the effort.

The next two games saw SA kick it up a notch as they comfortably dispatched Malta 25-5, with three goals to Muller, and Ireland 27-3, with Muller on target six times and Meecham scoring twice.

This put them into the final against England, and despite a valiant effort, with Muller scoring twice and Meecham once, SA went down 12-6, to take the silver medal.

Next up for Meecham and Muller will be the Fina World U20 Championshipss to be held in Volos, Greece in September.

Two other East London girls, Megan Thompson, who is also at Stirling, and Zandre Smit, who matriculated last year, will be in the team and they will be eager to do well at the showpiece event.