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Lisburn swimmer Nathan Taylor has plenty to celebrate

Nathan Taylor 
Nathan Taylor  Nathan Taylor 

FORMER Lisburn swimmer Nathan Taylor had plenty to celebrate on his 24th birthday recently.

First up, he collected his first winner’s medal in the Irish Premier Water Polo League and then found out shortly afterwards that he had been included in the Ireland squad for next month’s EU 10 Nation tournament in Malta.

He will be joined on international duty by four of his Brugha colleagues and his outstanding coach Peter Cassidy, who recently won the Belfast Sports Coach of the Year Award 2016. Peter was happy to accept an invitation from National coach Mick Banks to go poolside with the team to provide additional expertise.

Nathan is one of a rare breed these days who has successfully made the transition from competitive swimming to water polo. He said: “I really enjoyed my time with Lisburn Swimming Club and still compete for Leander in the Provincial Towns League when there is no clash with my polo commitments. My only regret is that I didn’t take up polo earlier.”

There is no stopping the Lisburn flier these days as he jets over to Cardiff this weekend with a big contingent of local undergraduates to represent the Irish Universities in Water Polo at the Celtic Games.

They are Stephen Durkan, Matt and Nathan Hanna, Daniel Moore and Conor McCool on the men’s side and Maggie Burlington, Amy Ross, Ellen Judd and Aoife Ni Dochartaigh on the women’s team. The tournament finishes on Saturday night and he and Stephen Durkan are on the early morning flight to Dublin to play for Brugha in the Bro.Philip Cup at the NAC.

The Ireland squad for Malta is: Eoin Doyle, Barry Murphy (Sandycove), Jamie Cope (North Dublin), Eoin Nolan, Adam Caulfield, Tiernan Colvin and Eoin Bridgeman (St Vincent’s), Shane Moraghan, Mark Fitzgerald (Half Moon), Johnny Donnelly (capt), Chris Devlin, Adrian Hanna, Stio McMahon and Nathan Taylor (all Brugha).

Also travelling will be Cara Mulcahy (physical therapist) and Amanda Ní Ghabhann (general manager). Ireland’s current most capped player Chris Hodgkinson is unavailable for this tournament.

The 10 competing teams are split into two groups of five with Ireland in with Lithuania, Wales, Austria and South Africa. The other group is Malta, Czech Republic, Scotland, Switzerland and Poland.

DONEGALL Diamond’s Sam Brown was Ireland’s leading scorer with12 goals in the Ladies U17 EU 8 Nation tournament in Odense/Denmark. Ireland finished in sixth place.