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‘Once in a lifetime opportunity’: Four student teams head to university Euro champs for first time

The University of Bristol's women's football firsts. Smif Sports Photography

Bristol's men’s water polo first team. FineTime Photography

Bristol's men's fustal first team. Club captain Luis de La Riva Brown is pictured in white. Futsal squad member Max Dauskardt

Press release issued: 9 March 2023

Four University of Bristol teams have for the first time qualified for the European University Sports Association (EUSA) Championships.

For most of the student athletes in the football, table tennis, water polo and futsal teams this will be the highest level of competition they ever play in.

This summer, they head to four locations across Europe to compete with the best university teams on the continent. Many of those they face play at the elite level.

The University is supporting the teams through its facilities and its strength and conditioning team, sports psychologist and nutritionist.

Matt Paine, Performance Sports Manager at the University, said it was “impressive and inspiring” to see “our incredible students competing against some of the very best in the world”.

He added: “Our teams have had a fantastic season and it’s great to see them getting rewarded for their hard work.”

Women’s football

After winning the league, the women’s football team are feeling on-form for their EUSA Championships in Tirana, Albania.

Despite being knocked out of the national cup in February, they are continuing their busy training schedule before the tournament starts on June 25.

Thirteen players are heading to the Albanian capital for the seven-a-side championship, which starts with group stages and moves on to knock-outs.

Club captain and right back, Lizzie Moisan (Security, Conflict and Human Rights), said: “We're really looking forward to the EUSA games, it's an amazing, once in a lifetime opportunity for us that we're really going to take advantage of. Now we’ve finished our season, the tournament is our main focus.

“We don't normally compete in seven-a-side, so we're purely focussing on learning and training towards that set-up. We hope to do our best, we don't know the standard yet, but we want to get as far as we can, maybe that gets us a medal who knows?

“The main thing is that we work really hard but we also want to enjoy ourselves and take in the moment.”

Men’s futsal

The EUSA Champs for Futsal – a fast-paced, indoor version of football similar to five-a-side – kicks off in Split, Croatia, from July 18.

The team is on-form and has seen a groundswell in numbers over the past few seasons. This season they placed second in their league and next week they play in the cup quarter-final.

Club captain Luis de La Riva Brown (International Business Management), said: “It’s a massive deal for us to make the EUSAs and representing the uni is great. It shows that we’ve reached a peak and hopefully we can keep this momentum over the coming seasons.

“We often play the same teams, so it’ll be amazing to play Croatian clubs, Latvian clubs, clubs from all over Europe.”

Men’s table tennis

After a successful season, the men’s table tennis first team play Nottingham Trent in the UK semi-finals next week, while their EUSA campaign in Olomouc, Czech Republic, begins on July 4.

They have been boosted this season by three recent additions to the team: Cypriot student Joseph Elia (Mechanical Engineering), who has competed in the Commonwealth Games, and Chinese students, Jinghao Wang (International Commercial Law) and Jiameng Zhao (Social and Cultural Theory), who have played at the elite level in China.

“All three are incredible players who have brought a real professionalism to our training,” said club captain Billy Keegan (Aerospace Engineering).

“We’re so excited about the tournament, I never thought I’d be able to play in such a big competition. We’ve been so close to qualifying before, so it’s great to actually pull it off.”

Men’s water polo

The 13 first team water polo players are training hard ahead of their EUSA competition in Miskolc, Hungary, starting July 13.

Last season the team won the league unbeaten and this year they came second.

Club captain Jude Tinkler-Davies (Economics), said: “We’re treating it like a professional tournament and we want to put our best foot forward. We’re taking a physio with us and we’ve got a detailed training plan.

“We’ve got five or six international players from Kuwait, Hungary, South Africa and Egypt who are all really good, with really different styles. The whole team are good friends inside and outside the pool.

“There’s a lot of excitement in the team. For about half the players, this will be last thing they do for Bristol Water Polo and it’s a culmination of years of hard work.”

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