Monday 16 / December / 2024
Rio de Janerio: The water polo competition at the Rio Olympics gets underway with a huge splash on Saturday when the sport's superpower, Hungary, take on world champions and men's tournament favourites Serbia.
The Hungarians claimed the last of their nine gold medals in Beijing eight years ago, winning the title for the third successive Games, and will be desperate to restore national pride after slumping out in the quarter-finals at the 2012 Games in London.
Serbia, meanwhile, earned a second successive bronze in London but have won pretty much everything since, capturing four world league titles from 2013 as well as the 2015 world championships in Kazan.
The Serbians are on a quest for a first Olympic gold, although Yugoslavia won three golds in 1968, 1984 and 1988.
Saturday's clash at the Maria Lenk Aquatic Center has been much anticipated since the draw pitched the teams together in Group A for the first round.
The Serbia squad is already the most successful national team in the country's relatively short sporting history, raising the pressure on the team to prevail in Rio.
The team is anchored by the prolific Andrija Prlainovic, who was named the most valuable player earlier this year at the European championships where Serbia beat Olympic champions Croatia in the final.
Prlainovic should feel at home in Rio, having played for local club Fluminense in 2010.
Also looking to claim one of the four quarter-final berths from Group A are medal contenders Australia and hosts Brazil, who will be guided by former Croatia coach Ratko Rudic.
Rudic has won four gold medals with three different teams as a coach at past Games.
In Group B, Croatia and the United States meet in the second match of the tournament, also on Saturday.
Women's champions the United States, who have won a medal at every Summer Games since women's water polo was included for the first time in Sydney in 2000, first take to the pool on Tuesday, when they face Spain in a re-match of the 2012 final.
