Water polo player Mikhailov – about his performance at the World Masters Championship in Doha: “The team contributed a fee and left, they treated us kindly”

Water polo player Pavel Mikhailov said that at the World Masters Swimming Championships in Doha, the neutral team of Russian players was treated kindly.

Russian water polo players from a neutral team won gold at the World Masters Swimming Championships in the 35 and over category. During this tournament, teams in the 35+, 30+ and 40+ age categories were grouped into one group. The Hungarian Bull’s Blood competed in the 40 and over category and the Romanian Pol in the 30 and over category. Cluj-Napoca. A team with a neutral status, consisting of Russian players, won against Romanian opponents and lost against the Hungarian team. All age categories were assigned separately.

– We play in the National Water Polo Association (NWA) for different teams, we went to the World Championship as the Capitals team – we called it that because half of the team is from Moscow, l the other half of St. Petersburg.

— Who are the players on your team?

— The guys are not stars, they are average players. I played Baltika three years ago, I was already 30 years old. I worked at my job and at the same time did training with them. Now I play with amateurs from St. Petersburg, we take second place in the second league. We want to play! The NVA is a good tournament, we like it.

— Did you give money for the trip?

— Yes, we had to pay 50 thousand rubles for everyone’s participation, plus five thousand each individually to create a profile on World Aquatics. We bought the tickets ourselves, booked the hotel ourselves and contacted the organizers ourselves.

— Our professional athletes did not go to the World Championships in Doha. How was the situation there?

— There were no questions for us. The Canadians, Brazilians, Romanians and Hungarians treated us very kindly. In the water, in the game, everything is hard, but outside the pool everything was excellent and we were judged normally, like everyone else,” Mikhailov told .