Indonesia defeated Cambodia 37-2 in the first tournament of men’s water polo in the 32nd SEA Games 2023 at Phnom Penh’s Olympic Stadium.

Water polo is a team sport played in a pool, where two teams of seven players each try to score goals using a ball and their hands. The game is played over four quarters, with each quarter lasting eight minutes.

The objective of the game is to score more goals than the opposing team. The ball can be advanced by swimming with it, passing it to a teammate, or shooting it towards the goal.

Players can only hold the ball with one hand at a time, and must pass or shoot the ball within 30 seconds of possession.

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Indonesia defeated Cambodia 37-2 in men’s water polo at Olympic Stadium. Kiripost/Mon Sokeo

At the Olympic Stadium on Friday, the Cambodian men's water polo team was defeated by Indonesia in the first set of 0-8 and 1-14 in second set, third set of 0-5, and fourth set of 1-10.

Sopha Cheng, Cambodia’s water polo player, said that that was all the team could do. “This was all our capabilities in the competition. We have not played this sport in the last 40 years,” Sopha told Kiripost.

“Now it just appeared again in Cambodia and we just began and trained again in the short time to play with Indonesia, they had a lot of experience,” he added. “Our capabilities are lower than them and we still have limits so that is why we were difficult to play against them,” Sopha said.

Sopha said that the team trained for five months for the SEA Games and that the next tournament will be against Thailand.

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“Our team will try our best to do better than with Indonesia,” he said.

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