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@ Bill - You reject me examples of a cyclist and a golfer, and then you bring up football. But what about the fact that players in the top two teams in the world are over 30? You don't address that because you can't. So just keep on eliding it.
The reason I keep bringing up fooball is because the two activities of bike polo & football are similar enough that there are likely to be many cross-over aptitudes, in the way that you find that many good ball players are good at all ball sports, whereas golfing is low impact, and cycling, at least the kind of cycling that Lance is good at, relies heavily on endurance, which is a physical attribute which degrades relatively slowly, unlike speed and coordination.
It's pretty obvious that as most people have been playing the game less than 3 years, then a couple of guys who have been playing the game for double that period are superior because they have had more practise.
If there were 2 guys of 21 that had been playing for 5 years or more, I think that there is a very good chance that they would be superior to Ben & Joe. This is what science tells us about certain kinds of high impact sports that require ball control at high speeds - experience is important, but so are speed, flexibility & coordination, all of which are superior in the young.
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Football is a game where the players get an edge from athleticism. It's been evolving as a game for 100+ years so coaching techniques and information have been refined and passed on. All players at the top level have similar experience levels (youth team to first team) so they use other things to gain an edge.
Bike polo is a game where there are many different experience levels, consequently experience counts for more.
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• #582
This thread is awesome. Two days ago: history. Yesterday: the maths of Swiss rounds. Today: sports science.
Fuck the Euros.
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If there were 2 guys of 21 that had been playing for 5 years or more, I think that there is a very good chance that they would be superior to Ben & Joe.
I will agree with this argument. I will also point out that it has zero relevance to the question of whether inclusivity (in Dan's sense) should be a criterion when deciding how to structure the Qualies for this year.
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@James - fine. But what we are talking about here is something very specific: How to structure the qualifiers for this year. The road to the Euros can be bigger and more inclusive, but this is not something that can happen through the actual qualifying process for this year.
I agree with this statement, and I also think that we should be looking at capping the entry to qualifying tournament for this year AS WELL AS looking at how to do it for next year.
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I will agree with this argument.
Hey, can everyone see that? Chukker & I are agreeing on something. That doesn't happen often.
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It wasn't my point about Lucas winning the Worlds 2020 single-handedly, although I agree with Neil's point on that.
The difficulty for the current top UK teams (Cosmic especially) is that to get better, you need to play a variety of better people, and how often do they get to do that? Only at tournaments it seems, and even then there's only a handfful of teams better than them.
Same as Black Stabbath in Brum - the top players don't get any better because we're a small to middling scene with 50% of players who started in the last 6 months, and we're too lazy/busy to go to London/Cambridge/Manchester all the time and mix it up with people better than us.
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Some of the top euro teams come from pretty small/isolated scenes, I know it's easier for them to play in other euro countries but it's not like they're doing it every other week.
That's true. Polysynthese being the prime example.
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Less bitching + more polo = better players, no?
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Less players = more practise.
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Less bitching + more polo = better players, no?
I don't the bitching has any bearing on player skills.
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Bitching takes up time
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• #594
So does drinking, but let's not get crazy about this.
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Less players = more practise.
Yep, to the point where I'm now really good at running rings round beginners, play well when there's nothing at stake and there's space on the court. I practise those things for 4-6 hours every week! But play against a slightly better team, and we get whooped.
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Drinking helps with polo performance, bitching doesnt
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Selection process for EHBPC 2011 23-26.06.2011
Posted by
@James - fine. But what we are talking about here is something very specific: How to structure the qualifiers for this year. The road to the Euros can be bigger and more inclusive, but this is not something that can happen through the actual qualifying process for this year.