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Stingers One-Point Loss in Quarter-Final Thriller

Water Polo Australia

In the quarter finals of the World Aquatics Championships, the Australian Women’s Water Polo went down to World Cup champions Greece by one goal in the dying seconds of the game, 8-7.

The scores were locked 7-7 with eight seconds left on clock, but the Aussie Stingers inexplicably turned over the ball and Greece managed to swim toward the Aussie goal, shooting from outside to beat the buzzer, scoring with two seconds left on the clock.

There were never more than two goals separating the teams throughout the game, and while Greece were able to take narrow leads at the end of the second and third quarters, the momentum had certainly shifted the Aussies’ way in the final quarter.

It was always going to be an emotion-charged game for the two sides, having faced off in the quarter finals at the 2024 Paris Olympics where Australia were able to take the win and go on to win the silver medal. But like Australia, the Greeks have a new look team and have already achieved strong results in this Olympic cycle.

Newly named Aussie Stingers captain, dual Olympian and NSW Institute of Sport (NSWIS) scholarship holder Bronte Halligan, said naturally the team is devastated that they won’t have the opportunity to play for a World Championship medal.

“That’s a really tough result. As Bec [Rippon, Aussie Stingers Head Coach] put it ‘that quarter final water polo you’ve got to take stick in it right to the end’ and we did. The Greeks also did that but we showed real heart out there and I couldn’t be more proud of our girls for water polo we put together out there tonight.”

“We put together four quarters of tough, hard on the line water polo and that’s all you can ask for as a Captain. It’s a tough loss and it’s going to sting for a little bit, but the girls will hold their heads high knowing we did everything we could have.

“Four of the girls in our team, it was their first quarter final, and quarter finals water polo at a World Championships is always tough, it’s do or die. The result didn’t go our way, but I think we can take a lot away from that game.

“This is a stepping stone and we really want to build this squad, we have a lot more goals. I think it’s exciting to see where we are going to go over the next few years during this Olympic cycle,” she said.

Rippon echoed Halligan’s sentiment, saying despite the disappointment of the loss, there is a lot they can build on from here as they set their sights on LA 2028.

“We spoke about it before the game, that this is what we do all the hard work for, these big moments, and we go out there and leave everything we’ve got in the pool and I think we did that tonight.

“It is a heartbreaking way to lose, but we did leave everything out there and I’m proud of the team.”

“We played them [Greece] in Paris, but they had a different group and a different style. They’ve really changed since then and we saw that at the World Cup earlier this year and they have shown they are definitely a team to be reckoned with. This is not a surprise that they’re up here competing for the medals.

“We came here with big ambitions so to not reach those is disappointing, but if I can just look at the games we’ve played and the things that we’ve learnt and the performances we’ve put forward, I’m proud.

“We now need to go home and analyse this campaign as we continue to build towards LA 2028,” she said.

The team includes multiple NSWIS scholarship holders such as Hayley Ballesty, Sienna Green, Bronte Halligan, Sienna Hearn, Dani Jackovich, Tilly Kearns, Alexie Lambert, Gen Longman, and Olivia Mitchell, as well as NSWIS staff – Senior Sports Physiotherapist Bernie Petzel and Sport Performance Analyst Joshua Dipple.