Saturday, February 23, 2008

Olympic Sadness

I don't want this blog to ever be a place for negative venting. But, I have to mention my disappointment in the failure of the Canadian women to qualify for the Olympic Games. This was never the fault of a single person so no blame can be assigned; the structure of the National Team program makes this impossible. However, there are some things that need to be discussed openly and honestly by Water Polo Canada if we hope to right this problem any time soon. If that discussion does not take place then there will certainly be some public negativity, people have been holding their tongues for awhile so as to not upset any recent Olympic hopes.

My observations here are not "wisdom from hindsight"; anyone that knows me knows that I openly talk about the problem of national training centres very honestly and provide credible alternatives. It has been hard to have discussion on this when 100% of the NT staff are from Montreal and 80% of the athletes are from Montreal, or Quebec (to acknowledge where Johanne originates). I love and respect the blood, sweat and tears every one of them has given to the sport that last 4 years, they are not the problem with the sport.

So, why am I saying things that are not empty sympathy? Well, that failure in Imperia Italy today impacts all of us, every club and coach in Canada has taken a hit. The dreams of our female athletes are now more distant and the hill they must climb even more steep and with less secure footing. Funding will be shortened or withdrawn all the way down to our various PSO's. If we had been involved in a partnership with clearly articulated goals, published national tactics, accepted age specific skill sets, intelligent domestic competition, then we could share the failure of the Olympic Qualification. But we were not, so we can't.

I hope we can avoid blaming athletes and coaches. Pat, in particular, has lead us to plenty of international joy so this is no time to forget that. Let's keep the focus on the systemic shortcomings, work to fix them quickly, be open to ideas that have not seen wide discussion in years past. China showed us at last summer's World Juniors that you can make phenomenal strides in a very short time with a focussed, meaningful domestic plan. You don't have to look at too many Canadian championship results at the Cadet and Youth level to see that the past 5 years have provided plenty of great talent from outside Quebec, coaches and athletes, maybe some of them can become part of the family that works to make a more solid foundation.

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