Indy Nash '24 Recruiting Profile

My name's Indy and I'm a British water polo player who represented Great Britain at U17 and currently represent them at u19 (playing up an age group), the English Schools Swimming Association (ESSA) and Worthing Water Polo club. I have been playing water polo since I was eleven, initially at a low level, just for my local team. I trained once a week until I was thirteen years old, when I was scouted to represent my county team (Kent) for an inter-county tournament, which we won.  Following this, I was chosen to play for my regional team (South-East England) and competed in an U14 inter-regional tournament against teams from the rest of Great Britain.   I was spotted by scouts during this tournament and selected to be a part of the England development squad. I started as a utility player because I was big and fast, but at that stage I had had far less coaching and far less game experience than the majority of the other boys.  It was perhaps inevitable but no less devastating for that, when I was cut from the team.  I was told that, if I wanted to have any chance of returning, I had to play more polo at a higher level, learn about the tactics of the game, and improve my technique. In all honesty, it felt like a huge mountain to climb, particularly when the pandemic hit as well, and I think my family and friends thought I would just give up on water polo. 

I was devastated but it never occurred to me to stop trying: water polo had already become my passion and I was not going to give up at the first hurdle.  Alongside continuing to play for my local team, I joined the Worthing team where the regional coach and many of the regional team were based and started travelling over an hour each way to extra training sessions twice a week during school time and sometimes five days a week during school vacations! I also started to read and watch as much water polo content as I could get my hands on and to focus on playing centre forward. I decided that I wanted to play centre-forward as my coach felt that I had the potential to play there due to my size and strength and I found that I loved the position and the impact I was able to have on my team's performance. I pushed myself really hard for two years, getting better technically, learning the skills of a centre forward, and increasing my water polo IQ.  Then in the space of a few months things finally began to fall into place.  I represented the South-East region, when it finished second in the U16 inter-regional tournament, and Worthing Club when it won the U16 London League and the U17 National Age Group Championships.  Finally, I was selected for the England Schools Swimming Association water polo squad before being invited back to join the British U17 squad.

In terms of my collegiate goals, I obviously would love to play as much water polo as I can and at the highest possible level. This passion inspired me to sign up for a gap year at BIWPA in order to gain more life experience, learn a new language and obviously play much more polo at a high level. This does mean that whilst I graduate High School in 2024 I will be starting college summer of 2025.

I have always been successful academically, and value my education.   I would therefore like to go to a school that will not only allow me to be the best water polo player that I can be, but will also challenge me academically. I am not fully decided yet about what courses I want to take, but I am currently studying English literature, Biology and Chemistry, all of which I am enjoying.