Selborne will be up against it

THE country’s oldest school water polo tournament, the Vides is set to get its 43rd edition under way at Selborne College on Thursday night.

The annual tournament held its first event back in 1976 and since then has seen 10 winners of the prestigious Vides.

Hosts Selborne have picked up the most wins, triumphing 20 times since taking the inaugural title and head into this week’s event as defending champs.

Fellow Eastern Cape sides and fierce rivals Grey High School and St Andrew’s College are then tied with the next most titles, having picked up four each, and as always will be among the favourites with the hosts.

It will add that bit of intrigue. St Stithians College from Johannesburg and Muir College from Uitenhage then have three titles each, but neither are taking part in this year’s edition.

Reddam House from Johannesburg next come in with two Vides titles and they will be one of the favourites this year, while rivals Dale and Queen’s College are also on the list with two wins however they are also not taking part this year.

Hudson Park High School and Kearsney College then round out the tournament winners with one apiece.

The 18 teams competing this year are Alexander Road, Northwood, Durban High School, Crawford Lonehill, St Alban’s, Paul Roos, Glenwood, Grey PE, Glenwood House, Reddam, St Andrew’s, Hudson Park, Stirling, Kingswood, Pearson, Grey College, Selborne and Selborne Collegians.

All the games will be four chukkas of six minutes playing time (stop-start) with one time out.

The final will be four chukkas of seven minutes (stop start).

The action gets under way on Thursday evening at 5pm with four games being played.

St Andrew’s take on Stirling first up, followed by Grey High v Hudson Park, Paul Roos v Glenwood House and then Grey Bloem v Selborne Collegians.

The majority of the teams will then start on Friday morning from 7am, with the Vides tournament concluding at 6pm on Saturday.

All games will be played at Selborne College and Hudson Park.