After more than three frenetic weeks, the 19 teams who have been battling for Cartier glory have reduced down to just four. These remarkable squads will face their penultimate battle on Wednesday in their bid to win through to Sunday’s Cartier Queen’s Cup Final.
Match 1:
The first match on Wednesday will feature the winners from Saturday’s quarter-finals – Park Place and Dubai.
Park Place had a dominant game over La Dolfina/Scone, beating David Paradice’s team 18-9. Andrey Borodin’s Park Place, again featuring Matias Maldonado in place of the injured patron, led from the first chukka. An impressive opening period gave them a commanding 5-1 lead and the blue shirts never looked back. Hilario Ulloa, no doubt inspired by his faultless penalty taking in the penalty shootout last week, was in dominant form for Park Place, scoring most of his team’s goals.
Chukka Breakdown:
Score Progression:
Game Statistics:
Match 2:
The weather deteriorated massively for the second quarter-final, with heavy rain showers making play difficult. It did not seem to affect Dubai, even though they had a change of lineup. Alfie Hyde replaced patron Rashid Albwardy who was injured.
Dubai led 2-0 after the first chukka and never relinquished this lead. They had managed to secure for themselves a comforting, six-goal lead (8-2) at the start of the sixth chukka and went to win this crucial match 9-4. This result was surprising because when these two teams met in the league stages it had been a very different affair. UAE Polo Team had won that encounter 14-8. Dubai, a six-times winner of the Queen’s Cup, had clearly taken note of their opponent’s gameplan and effectively shut down UAE’s attack in this quarter-final contest. The 10-goaler Jeta Castagnola led this Dubai team from the front, seemed undaunted by the weather conditions and was brilliantly supported by every one of his Dubai team-mates.
Chukka Breakdown:
Score Progression: 
Game Statistics:
All games of the Queens’s Cup can be seen here
Polocam.tv – Quality Streaming Service
Image credit Pablo Ramirez