Azernews.Az

By Amina Nazarli

The grandiose second Polo World Cup was held in Baku from September 5 to 7.

The competition was co-organized by World Polo GmbH Zurich, ARAF, Elite Horse Polo Club and Tatyana Sulzenbacher from Aztexnika. It took place in Polo Arena- in a completely new built polo stadium in Bina Equestrian Center. This was the second time that Azerbaijan was hosting the event.

Sponsored by such famous brands as Chopard, Maserati, Baltika7 and Embawood, the tournament brought together four professional teams from Argentina, U.S., Europe and Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijan's team was professionally trained by such strong coaches as the ones' of the Alegria Polo Farm in Buenos Aires, Raul Laplacette and his coaching staff, as well as well-known polo trainer, Thomas Winter from Hamburg.

Addressing the opening ceremony, President of Equestrian Federation of Azerbaijan, Elchin Guliyev spoke of the successes of the First World Cup held in Baku and stressed the state's attention and care to sports in the country.

In the opening game of the competition, European Union and Argentina teams faced each other. The team from Argentina defeated its rival 8:4.

The second match was held between U.S. and Azerbaijan's teams. Although the national team showed good results , Americans became the winner with a slight odd, 5:4.

On the second day of the competition, Azerbaijan faced Argentina. By gaining the victory, Argentina took the ticket to the final, where the team met with the European team, which had defeated earlier the U.S. team 8:5.

On September 7, Argentina took the first place and European Union the second. Azerbaijan and U.S. teams struggled for the third place. Azerbaijan defeated U.S. 8:4.

Azerbaijan has been a member of the World Polo Association FIP since last December.