Canada stumbles into quarters with 3rd consecutive loss in water polo Olympic qualifier
Canadians will now face top Group B finishers Russia in Friday's quarter-finals
Canada's hopes of qualifying for the Olympics for the first time since 2008 in men's water polo continues to dwindle after suffering a third consecutive loss, losing 19-6 to Greece on Thursday at the Zwemcentrum Rotterdam in the Netherlands.
Sean Spooner (Port Coquitlam, B.C.) ended that run with a goal for Canada (1-3), but Greece closed out the first quarter with a 6-1 lead.
The second quarter was much of the same as Greece continued to dominate Canada with a 4-1 difference. This was the story of the match as Greece outscored Canada 4-2 and 6-2 in the third and fourth quarters.
WATCH | Greece pummels Canada behind Stylianos Argyropoulos' 4-goal performance:
Nicolas Constantin-Bicari scored two goals for Canada, while Bogdan Djerkovic, Sean Spooner, Aria Soleimanpak and Max Schapowal scored the other four goals.
The Greeks had three players cross the three-goal mark in this one with Stylianos Argyropoulos scoring four, while Alexandros Papanastasiou and Ioannis Fountoulis each scoring three.
Canada to see Russia in quarter-finals
The loss puts Canada in fourth place coming out of the preliminary round in Group A, with the quarter-finals set to take place on Friday.
The top four teams in each of the two groups advance from the preliminary round. Group B consists of No. 2 Croatia, No. 14 Germany, No. 15 Russia, France, Romania and the Netherlands.
Russia's 11-10 win over hosts Netherlands on Thursday means that it will finish atop Group B and meet Canada next in the quarter-finals.
Only the top three teams from the tournament qualify to join the other nine teams that are already set to compete at the 2021 Tokyo Games.
The quarter-finals match on Feb. 19 will take place at 2 p.m. ET It will be streaming live on CBCSports.ca , the CBC Sports app, and Radio-Canada Sports.
