Hungarian Water Polo Team Faces Paris Olympics with Excellent Chances

MTI-Hungary Today 2024.01.03.

Olympic champion and coach Dániel Varga believes that the Hungarian men’s water polo team is a medal contender at the summer games in Paris.

The coach, who currently manages OSC (Orvosegyetem Sport Club) but will take charge of BVSC (Budapesti Vasutas Sport Club-Zugló) in the summer, told M1 news channel that the answer to the question about Hungary’s Olympic chances is always the same: that they can make it onto the podium.

It is good that the national team already has its quota, because this way we can experience the European Championships starting this week, and the World Championships in February a bit differently.

By the time the team leaves for Paris, I am sure that the 13 players who make up the team, as well as the staff, will be ready to take the hurdles step by step,” emphasized Dániel Varga, who stood on the highest step of the Olympic podium in Beijing in 2008.

He believes that OSC’s Balázs Hárai and Vince Vigvári have the best chance of being part of Zsolt Varga’s squad. He added, however, that the task of the head coach is difficult because the Hungarian national team is strong, there is a lot of competition and many people other than the “superstar core” are competing for the remaining places.

Asked if he had ever thought of working as a head coach of the national team, he said yes, but noted that his current task is to develop as a coach, to learn, and teach others, so that once he gets the opportunity, the Hungarian team will have “the best possible Dániel Varga.”

Dániel Varga. Photo via Facebook/OSC Waterpolo

Asked about his change of club this summer, the coach stressed that he would use the current extended break from the league to build for the future so that he can concentrate all his energy on OSC for the next six months, because he wants to get the best out of his current players and achieve success with them.

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Fact

The Hungarian men’s water polo team is doing excellently in all international arenas, including the Olympic Games. They are considered the world’s top power in the history of water polo, having won 16 Olympic, 12 World Championship, 10 FINA World Cup, eight FINA World League, 26 European Championship, and 17 Summer Universiade medals. Hungary missed five Olympics, but they have won the title nine times, which is a record. The men’s water polo team first triumphed at the 1932 games in Los Angeles. In the early 2000s, the water polo team won three consecutive gold medals in a row: in Sydney in 2000, Athens in 2004, and Beijing in 2008. In the last three games, the team finished fifth in both London in 2012, and Rio de Janeiro in 2016. At the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, they were again on the podium, finishing third.

It should also be mentioned that in 2023, the men’s water polo team won the gold medal at the World Championships in Fukuoka, beating Greece 14-13.

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Via MTI, Featured image via Facebook/waterpolo.hu