Guy Schwarzenbach’s Black Bears team continue unbeaten in this year’s Cartier Queen’s Cup, today narrowly defeating Jindal Steel/La Dolfina at Coworth Park. The Bears had a strong first half – the Panelo brothers (Tommy and Benjamin) seem to have some kind of telepathy on the field. They were also helped by the handful of fouls from Jindal Steel/La Dolfina, giving Schwarzenbach’s team a comfortable 8-3 lead at half-time. It was a good thing Black Bears started strongly though as Jindal Steel/La Dolfina, who were hunting down their first win in this tournament, came out fighting in the second half. Goals that had gone wide for them in the first half were now sailing through off the sticks of Rufino Merlos, Adolfo Cambiaso and Gonzalo Ferrari. Black Bears did enough though, including a goal from Schwarzenbach, to stay ahead at the end of the fifth (11-9) but this was now anyone’s game. Ferrari closed the gap first and a Cambiaso penalty levelled the scores with four minutes left on the clock. A penalty 2 in favour of Jindal Steel/La Dolfina put them in the lead for the first time – they had scored the last four goals on the trot – a remarkable turnaround. A Black Bears penalty was saved by Merlos, only for Benjamin Panelo to convert a penalty 2 to level the score. Then with just 30 seconds remaining Black Bears were awarded another penalty 2. Benjamin fired this through to maintain Black Bears winning run.
Image credit: Art of Polo
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Second Match
The second game on the Princes’ Ground was a completely different affair. A slow scoring tussle that never really got going. Unfortunately for the UAE Polo Team they were forced to make team changes as Juan Martin Nero had returned to Argentina due to a family bereavement. So Jehangiri Polo’s Gonzalo Pieres substituted for the nine-goaler. As Pieres plays off seven goals the two-goaler Hazel Jackson played in place of Sheikha Maitha to bring the team tally back up to 22 goals. Such changes invariably disrupt a team but neither squad seemed to get much of a hold of this game in the early chukkas. Santos Merlos opened the scoring for Dubai in the first, but the score was still only 4-2 in favour of Dubai at half-time. The UAE’s Lukin Monteverde worked hard to keep his team in contention, while Castagnola did the same for Dubai. When Monteverde converted a penalty to close the gap to 8-7 in the final minutes of the match, spectators wondered if this would be another overtime. Lucas Criado and Castagnola had other plans and the latter picked up a great pass from Criado and riding the super speedy Lovelocks Fidel, fired through the winner. This victory makes Dubai the first team to have secured three wins in this year’s tournament.
Image credit: Art of Polo
The Teams:
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Stats provided by https://poloreport.com/