Moor Hall Farm (MHF) Polo founders, Alec and Edward Banner-Eve, have joined Harold Hodges for the 15 Goal Arena Gold Cup this month, hosted by the Royal County of Berkshire Polo Club.

The prestigious tournament sees 8 teams across two leagues battle for the coveted trophy - with last years victors not entered this year, there is all to play for. Harold Hodges (6) is joining the MHF boys having already had a taste of the glory at the Arena Gold Cup 2017, when he played for the ‘Schools and Universities Polo Association’ (SUPA) team and won. Now the team is being backed by the affiliated ‘Schools Alumni Polo Association’ (SAPA) and has set its sights firmly on keeping the Gold Cup within the SUPA family.

The team have already begun - they faced Four Quarters Polo (Simon Arber, Tom Morely and Richard Tyrone) on Tuesday 13th Feb and came out victorious. Next up, the team played Sifani (Hilali Noordeen, Mikey Henderson and Ryan Pemble) on Thursday 15th where they again came away with a win after a very closely fought match. Saturday will see them take on HB Polo (Josh Cork, Sebastien Pailloncy and Adolfo Casablal).

Schools and Universities polo is one of the fastest growing areas of the sport (the recent University Winter Championships saw over 170 teams competing from across the UK), and last year’s victory by the SUPA team at the Arena Gold Cup was evidence to support the ever-increasing standard of youth polo. With the Uni polo scene developing into an affordable training ground for young polo talent, eyes are turning towards bridging the gap between the student sports societies and the regional polo clubs that will provide the students with polo upon graduation. SAPA has been developed in association with SUPA (forgive the similar acronyms) to champion accessible polo for graduates and school leavers - it aims to bring together the community of alumni and provide opportunities for continuation of polo, post-education.