Captain Aaron Feltham works out during the Canadian men's water polo team practice in Calgary, March 20, 2012.TODD KOROL
Canada's male water polo players don't mean to look past the preliminary round of Olympic qualification, because that's dangerous. A surprising underdog can bite.
But the reality is that the crossover game that matches the first four teams of the two pools will determine if they get to the Olympic Games in London this summer.
"Brazil's in our group again, and we met them in the Pan American final, but that's not the biggest game. And Spain may be the toughest in our group. But the game that matters is the crossover game April 6," said Canadian captain Aaron Feltham of Lindsay, Ont., in a conference call Monday.
Canada is in a pool with Spain, Brazil, Venezuela, Turkey and Argentina in the April 1-8 tournament in Edmonton. Canada has home pool advantage and should make the top four for the crossover round. The top four in Canada's pool meet the top four of a much stronger pool which features Montenegro, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Germany, Greece, Romania and the Netherlands.
"We'll use the round-robin games to practise our concentration and be able to play the full four quarters with as few lapses as possible," said Feltham, who has played professional water polo in Hungary.
"The difference in this team and the Canadian team that played in Beijing in 2008 is that this team is younger but it's more together. A lot have been playing in Calgary for the last two years," said team manager Neil Muir. The Canadians will have an advantage in playing the qualifying tournament at home – familiar food and language and less travel for the young team based in Calgary – to go along with a decidedly easier pool in the long tournament.
The Canadian men's team is peaking at just the right time, head coach, Dragan Jovanovic of Calgary said in a statement.
The 13-man squad has been praised by the coach for its work ethic and commitment.
"This group of athletes has been training extremely hard for months and we've had some very good international results over that period," said Jovanovic, who has led the team program since 2004. "There's no question in my mind that we're fit enough to compete with any of the other teams in the tournament. If we play to our potential, then we've got an excellent chance to qualify for this summer's Olympics."
"It's a test of endurance, for sure, since we'll be playing top level teams every day for at least five days in a row, and hopefully longer if we can make it out of the group stage," said Feltham. "But, having qualified for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, we know what it takes to compete at that level and to be successful."