Day 3 saw the final round of group games and these would sort out the semi final line up for the Ignition Polocrosse World Cup. With the top four teams already decided, as they all had two wins from two games, it was now simply up to them to sort out between themselves who would finish first and second in the group. For the other four nations their games would decide who would finish 3rd and 4th in each group, which was potentially of less significance given the apparent closeness in ability of those four nations.

The first game of the day saw the UK versus the USA. Both teams had lost to Zambia and Australia and on each occasion it was a reasonably comfortable margin. Both would like a win to give themselves confidence going into the knock out stages. However, they would probably also want to make sure they didn’t lose any good horses at a crucial stage so it might be a balancing act as to just how much you are willing to throw at a match which might ultimately have limited impact on whether you end 5th, 6th, 7th or 8th.  

The UK had looked a bit inconsistent up until now. They started well against Zambia but then couldn’t live with them as they improved after chukka 2. They started pretty poorly against Australia but then played better in the last four chukkas. Against the USA they reverted to their original form and started well. The ladies section of Layla Sics, Katie Woodward and Rachael Duhig got them off to a good start with a 3-1 victory. The USA ladies have looked strong in other games but they could only find one goal in this chukka.

The second chukka saw the USA men come out in an unexpected combination. They pushed Braxton Hamlin to number 3, whereas up until now he has been a permanent fixture in the number 1 shirt, and Houston Hutcherson took over the goal scoring duties. This unexpected move (which apparently might have actually been a bit of a surprise to Hamlin himself) actually worked okay. The USA men won the chukka by one goal with Hamlin winning ball and Hutcherson converting it. Hutcherson also seemed to force a couple of mistakes and turnovers from the UK number 3 Josh Smith as Hutcherson opted to play quite a close, physical game. The UK did score some goals when they got ball and at the end of the chukka the scoreboard read 5-4 in their favour.

Chukka 3 saw the USA ladies make a strange switch as well. Megan Swift has been their gun number 1 for this World Cup (as she was in 2019). Therefore, to suddenly see her come out in the number 3 shirt and Kat Liner, who has been very good at the back, go and take a rest did seem slightly unusual. Dori Johnson, who has a lot of experience having played in her first World Cup in 2011, came out in the number 1 shirt aboard a big strong looking horse that looked like it might be a bit of a handful at points. The chukka was not that high scoring but the USA did manage to level it up at 6 all.

The UK fans were probably getting nervous by this stage but chukka 4 would quickly settle their nerves. The USA again kept Braxton Hamlin at number 3 but switched Rahul Desai to number 1. All these switches mean that so far the USA have used four players at number 3, three at number 1 and (we think) three at number 2 as well. They just need to chuck Karl Balogh up front and give Braxton Hamlin a chukka in the middle and they have completed the full turnabout (we don’t believe there is a special prize for that but maybe there is)! However, the UK had made a switch of their own. Jack Brown went into number 3 and both he and Joel Sics started to win more ball. Stuart Dyson, who was guilty of missing a  couple of chances against Australia, was composed in front of the posts and threw some nice goals as the UK men stretched them out to a 12-7 lead.

The USA opted to go back to their more classic line up in chukka 5 with Swift up the front, Sarah Desai staying at number 2 and Kat Liner returning at number 3. However, the UK ladies were working well with Rachael Duhig starting to win more ball and Layla Sics was throwing some good goals in the area. The UK have struggled a little bit for a ladies number 1 going into this World Cup, with a few different players playing the role on different tours. For the last three World Cups Charlotte Pykett was mainly responsible for the goal scoring duties and before that they had Shelley King for 2003 and 2007. However, Layla Sics is showing what she can do in that role now and three games in on the World Cup she is definitely looking more and more comfortable up front and is good at winning loose ball in midfield. The UK ladies won the chukka 2-1 and the scoreline was stretched out to 14-8.

The USA again reverted to a more classic line up from their men. Hamlin went back to the front, Desai slotted in the middle and Hutcherson went out back. They did have a good last chukka, scoring 4 goals, and there were a couple of great takes from Braxton Hamin under pressure in the area. However, the UK scored two goals of their own and just took their time on the ball to make sure of a reasonably comfortable win at the end. The final score was 16-12 to the UK, confirming their third place in the group and meaning they would play whoever loses out of Ireland and Zimbabwe later in the day. Rachael Duhig and Stuart Dyson picked up the best players of the match awards.

Game number 2 for the day saw the home team South Africa take on New Zealand. South Africa’s performances in their first two games have been good but perhaps not spectacular throughout. They have won each game but were pushed more than many expected by both Zimbabwe and Ireland and the margins of victories were narrower than many expected until the last chukka, when on each occasion their men pulled out a big last chukka to stretch the lead a little.

New Zealand, on the other hand, have been probably slightly surpassing expectations. Ranked third in the world from the last World Cup but bringing quite a young team to this World Cup no one quite knew what to expect. They beat both Ireland and Zimbabwe in close fought games and now were assured on a semi final spot. Now they just had to beat South Africa to top the group and get the theoretically easier draw in the semi finals.

New Zealand’s ladies have been going particularly well at this World Cup but so have South Africa’s. Both featured quite young teams overall and both were felt to be well mounted so everyone was keen to see how they got on against each other. The opening chukka saw them trade some good goals but South grabbed a bit more possession and crept ahead 3-2. The men saw South Africa start in a more impressive fashion than in their last two games. Stef Harris was up the front and was banging through the goals from the start of the chukka, while Jarrod Richardson could only grab one goal in the chukka and missed one shot at goal. By the end of the chukka the scoreline was 8-3 and you started to feel that New Zealand might need something special from their ladies to bring this back.

Chukka 3 saw South Africa switch Jacquie Minnaar in for Lauren Heynes at the front of the line up, which is something they have done in previous matches as well, with Amy Cocker and Olivia King staying behind her. Mirren Tye stayed up front for New Zealand while Melissa Marlow dropped in for Mae Watson at number 2 and Kayla Murray stayed at number 3. With good horses on both sides the scoreline for the chukka ended at 3 all. Mirren Tye was mounted up on French Kiss who has some great moves and Tye can really fire in overarm goals when she is in the area. Jacquie Minnaar was on Rumba and scored some great running goals as she drove down the pitch and into the area.

With the scoreboard reading 11-6 the men came back out and South Africa had made a switch. Stef Harris was off the field and Chad von Benecke came on at number 1. It sometimes seems that once South Africa’s men start to score quickly it is very hard for other teams to even get the ball and this was one of those occasions. There were ten goals in total in the chukka, an impressive feat by itself, and nine of them went to South Africa. Steenkamp and Le Roux were winning ball when it went past von Benecke in the line out. Once von Benecke was in the area he was missing nothing at all. By the end of the chukka the scoreboard read 20-7 and you sensed this could be over for New Zealand.

South Africa’s ladies started strongly and stretched the lead even further. New Zealand’s ladies had to dig deep; having just seen your men’s section get rolled and now conceding goals themselves, it might have been easy to let their heads drop but they kept fighting. They grabbed four goals towards the end of the chukka. However, South Africa’s ladies also kept scoring and got five of their own throughout, making it a nine goal chukka overall. By this stage the game was going at lightning pace and no team was taking about more than 30 seconds to go from lineout to goals. The scoreline read 25 -11 at the end of the chukka and the men came back out for their final chukka.

The electric pace continued and New Zealand did continue to fight hard to the end. Stef Harris took over the goal scoring duties for South Africa again and was playing very well. One move involved polo hitting the ball over the thirty yard line, picking it up at pace in the area and then managing to throw a tight angle overarm through the posts.

New Zealand grabbed four goals and it was actually a level chukka until the last thirty seconds when New Zealand conceded a free goal for a body hit. They have at points in their last two games also been a bit wild with swings and this one made clear contact with Stef Harris and the umpires blew it straight away. This made it another 9 goal chukka and made the end score 30-15, which means goals were scored at an average rate of one every forty eight seconds which is incredibly impressive and did perhaps show that South Africa had moved up a gear after their first two matches.

At some points the pace did perhaps become scarily quick, particularly when players started changing lanes and cutting behind or in front of horses. From the side lines it did look like there were a couple of near misses that could have warranted an umpire’s whistle. Though it can be hard for both umpires and spectators to tell given the angles they are sometimes at and probably ideally you would want to have a bird’s eye view on some of the incidents to be able to see just how close behind they really were (we feel that for the next World Cup we need some overhead cameras on wires or some drone mounted cameras).

The end result was a comprehensive win for South Africa, much to the delight of their supporters. South Africa would top their pool with New Zealand second, meaning they would face whoever won the other pool out of Zambia and Australia. The two best player awards went to Jacquie Minnaar and Chad von Benecke.

The third match saw Ireland and Zimbabwe battle it out for third in the group. Both countries were without a win; having lost to New Zealand and South Africa in hard fought contests.

This match saw Sophie Sargeant and Debbie Harris face off against each other; they are the only two players at this World Cup who also played in the first World Cup in 2003. They played in that World Cup at quite a young age for the UK and were also team mates for the World Cup in 2007 (though Sophie couldn’t actually play due to a last minute injury). Both have now moved to new locations in the world, with Sophie first donning the Zimbabwe shirt in 2011 and Debbie Harris playing for Ireland in 2019 after four World Cup appearances for the UK.

It was clear fairly quickly that it was going to be a good battle between these teams, though the real question seemed to be whether either Ireland’s ladies or Zimbabwe’s men would prove just too strong for their opposition at points. Ireland started the better, with Joanna Lavery up front firing through some great goals as Dara Mangan and Debbie Harris worked hard behind her, winning ball and marking players. Zimbabwe didn’t let them all have it their own way and at the end of the chukka it was 4-2 to Ireland.

Zimbabwe’s men are strong and well mounted, with Western Music and Skadadle particularly catching the eye. Ireland’s men had five horses for the game, having lost two horses from their original pool of eight, including one that they have not been able to play yet but hope to have for the next round, and also having one horse in the pool that they have apparently decided not to play. However, there are still some good horses in their pool and they have shown that they are willing to mix it with any team in their last two games.

However, Zimbabwe’s men started the better and the score line levelled up. Ireland grabbed a couple of goals and were actually ahead by one goal but then missed a pass in the area and Zimbabwe went down the other end and scored to level the scores at 6 all at the end of the chukka.

Out came the ladies again and as they did yesterday Ireland had taken off Joanna Lavery and put Debbie Harris up front aboard a horse called Tanami, with Abbey Hamil slotting in at number 2. The change of number 1 did not change the scoreline at all from chukka 1, it was another 4-2 victory for Ireland with Harris both winning ball herself and Dara Mangan winning ball and delivering it to Harris to convert. There was one tight angle overarm shot that went wide but overall Ireland got back ahead to lead 10-8 at the mid way point.

Again the men came back out and again Zimbabwe closed up the gap. Nearly anything out the back was going to Ross Shand who was going very well. Though Stephen Nuzum was also battling hard in the Irish number 3 shirt and when he got the ball he did a great job carrying it often through some fairly big, hard tackles to deliver it to Seb Chambers for the goals. Ross Shand was going after Chambers in the area as well but the experience of the Irish number 1 told as he stayed calm and slotted his goals. Up the other end though Danie Swan was flying aboard Western Music and you knew once the ball was in his racquet a goal was coming fairly soon. At the end of the chukka it was 13 all and tied up for the ladies.

Ireland sent Joanna Lavery back out at number 1 and Debbie Harris returned to play number 2. As they have throughout the World Cup Zimbabwe kept their number 1 and number 3 unchanged in Sophie Sargeant and Kirsten Swan. For this chukka Michaela Dodd was in at number 2 instead of Polly Michael. Both sections battled very hard but Ireland again won the chukka, this time by just one goal. There was some great defence work from Dara Mangan, who was mounted up on a big chestnut horse called Firestorm. Between them they made Sophie Sargeant work very hard in the area for her two goals, holding her up for long periods of time before she could finally find a gap to thread the ball through the posts. Ireland scored three goals down the other end and the final goal came from a brilliant moment from Joanna Lavery who got the ball, battled her way through to the area and threw up an offside bounce under a lot of pressure from Kirsten Swan. The bounce was slightly behind her as she turned for it but she stretched back, pulled it in very well and completed her turn to fire it through the posts and put Ireland ahead by 16 goals to 15.

However, there was always a fear the Irish men might need more than a one goal lead to hold off Zimbabwe and so it proved. Ross Shand plucked balls out the back and Danie Swan converted them into goals. Ireland kept going, Conor Doyle grabbing ball in the middle and Seb Chambers scored more goals but the end scoreline read 21-18 to Zimbabwe as they overpowered Ireland at the final hurdle and confirmed their third spot in the group. Danie Swan won best male player and Dara Mangan picked up best female player for the game.

The final game of the day was the one everyone was excited about, the reigning World Champions Australia against the highly rated Zambian team. At stake was the right to play New Zealand in the semi finals, which definitely looked like the easier route to the final after watching South Africa play New Zealand earlier in the day. So the expectation was of a battle royale as two of the top teams in the world, each bristling with star names, met. The crowd was more behind Zambia. African nations tend to support each other at World Cups and a lot of supporters seem to consider Zambia their second favourite team, possibly because they always seem like the plucky, small underdog battling the bigger polocrosse nations of Australia and South Africa The other reason might be that their supporters fan club, the Zarmy Army, is very loud, very colourful and pretty amusing. However, New Zealand’s supporters were clearly behind Australia, though given the test match results between New Zealand and Australia earlier in the year it is questionable whether their team would rather face Zambia than their neighbours in the semi finals.

However, the first chukka of the match started very scrappily. There were multiple missed chances at both ends and possession went back and forth between the two teams. It took about 3 minutes for there to be a goal and by the end of the chukka the score line was only 2-1 to Australia.

On came the men for chukka 2 and, as they did against the USA and the UK, the Australian men started with clear intention. The goals were flowing thick and fast from the racquet of Jimmy Grills, who scored at least two with backhanded shots while running parallel to the goal around the top of the D. Such showmanship so early on is really unheard of, especially in an Australian team where flashy stick skills have traditionally been secondary to winning and horse work. The horse work was pretty good as well, Jimmy Grills was mounted up on Cigarette and as the commentators pointed out he seems to be enjoying his time with it so much that he might have to take up smoking after this World Cup. Zambia did manage to get a couple of goals but by the end of the chukka it was 9-3.

The Zambia fans prayed that their ladies section, which is quite rightly feared, could pull things back. However, it was not to be, Australia were on a roll and it was irresistible. Lindsay Doolan was flying up the front and behind her Lucy Grills and Sam Allen were winning balls. Zambia could only get one goal while Australia slotted six more. Doolan was throwing big overarm goals over the top of Celicia Jacobs; there wasn’t even much pretence of working the area. Back in Australia some supporters, watching on the livestream, might have been torn between shaking their heads at the use of something as unseemly as an overarm goal and celebrating because Australia were comfortably winning what was meant to be their greatest challenge to date. The Zarmy Army briefly feel silent, possibly due to the shock of it all. The overarm goals were possibly really rubbing salt into their wounds as well, after all it is the African nations who specialise in those shots.

Back on came the men and if Zambian were going to do anything it had to be soon. Mikey Krynauw and Damien Harris have not moved from the number 1 and number 3 shirts at all this world cup yet and certainly they were not moving now. They are two of the best players in the world and, with Phillip Chalcraft sandwiched in between them, they renewed their fray with the Australian men. For Australia Matt Davison was out the back aboard Heart Breaker with Tom O’Neil in the middle and Jimmy Grills up front, though Cigarette was given a chukka off and instead Grills was riding a young horse called Maybe Mine which apparently was reasonably inexperienced. By the end of the chukka half the crowd would have probably taken Maybe Mine home if they could have. Five more goals flowed from Jimmy’s racquet, though a lot of the credit should probably go to Davison and Heart Breaker who was truly breaking Zambian hearts out back. Australia were just winning more ball in all areas of the pitch and without ball Zambia had no chance of puling this back. The score at the end of the fourth was 20-5 to Australia and only two huge chukkas would save Zambia.

Zambia’s ladies were due a stronger chukka and it finally came. Kelly Krynauw, Celicia Jacobs and Lauren Summers finding ball and getting it to the area for Krynauw to convert. However, Australia still scored a couple and the scoreboard read 22-9 when Lindsay Doolan and her horse Knuckles tripped while chasing ball in midfield and came down heavily, with Doolan partially trapped underneath the horse. Luckily after a few seconds (though it felt like longer to the watching crowd) Knuckles regained its feet and Lindsay Doolan soon followed. Medical teams did go and treat her on the pitch and initially it looked like she wanted to continue but her coaching team made the decision to take her off to ensure there was minimal risk of any injuries. She was replaced by Sam Allen up front who managed to thread one more goal before the end of the chukka and leave Australia with a 23-9 lead.

Zambia’s men were determined to end strongly and they did at least get the satisfaction of winning the last chukka. Mikey Krynauw found the goals on five occasions and Damien Harris and Phillip Chalcraft won ball behind him. Whenever Australia got the ball though a goal quickly followed and the end score was 26-14 to Australia. In the match Jimmy Grills and Lucy Grills won the two best player awards.

It was an impressive display from the world champions and undoubtedly a slightly disappointing one from a Zambia perspective. It means that Zambia will face South Africa in the semi finals while Australia play New Zealand.

Overall it was an excellent day of play and there are some exciting matches to look forwards to from Thursday onwards, some of which could be incredibly close. A lot may depend on how the teams are doing for horse power heading into those matches, a few horses have gone out over the first weekend but teams are hopeful that some will be vetted back in for the nest few rounds of matches, as they have been able to rest for a few days.

There is also now a clear drive on misuse of whips and spurs at the event, with teams apparently being told that if horses are found to have whip and spurs marks on them, depending on an assessment of the severity of the marks by a vet, players will have spurs and whips taken off them (something we did see on Monday) and potentially the horse could even be removed from the pool. Undoubtedly this is an important step forwards for the sport which must strive to ensure that horse welfare is front and centre, though the IPC obviously must also ensure that it is clear from the outset of the competition what the rules are and that they are being applied fairly and consistently across all teams and games, so that no one can complain that they were treated differently to others.

We look forwards to seeing play restart on Thursday, when we will also get the see the PASA development teams in action against the Barbarians team made up of players from a number of non World Cup polocrosse playing nations; France, Germany, Mexico, Argentina, Canada, Holland and Finland. We think it will be wonderful to see them in action on the world cup stage and will be there to cheer them on and encourage everyone else to come and do so as well!