Team USA’s Tommy Biddle, 10, Will Tankard, 4, and Patrick Uretz, 5, flew home with the silver after winning the 2014 International Arena Polo Test Match for the Bryan Morrison Trophy, played on March 1 at the All England Polo Club in Hickstead, England. Played annually, this was the first time since its inception in 2008 England has been defeated in this challenge.

Defeating Britain’s father-and-son duo of Chris Hyde, 9, and 16-year-old Jack Hyde, 3, along with Pete Webb, 7, by a score of 21-17 in a hard fought game, team captain Biddle said after the match, “Our team played phenomenal; I was a bit worried going in as I was playing with two younger guys who hadn’t played a lot at this level before but they were great. The other team was tough. Chris Hyde is an amazing player but my boys were after him the whole time. We knew Chris was a great stickman so we wanted to open the game up and make him have to chase us down. My teammates did a lot of work. I just happened to score a lot of goals.”

And score he did. The team led 7-2 after the first chukker, 13-6 after the second, and by the end of the third chukker, Team USA was leading 18-9. It wasn’t until the final chukker that England closed the gap, but it was too late and the Yanks won the trophy.

As is usual in cross-Atlantic tournaments, the home club supplied ponies for the visitors. All England Polo Club members, including Chairman John Bunn, offered their strings of ponies for the American team.

The English were really gracious, and good hosts,” says Patrick Uretz. “As well as we played, we had great horses that enabled us to show our skills. We were really well mounted.”

A senior at Westmont College, Uretz has been playing polo most of his life, and his first trip to England to play was at 14, when he crossed the pond with a pony club team.

Last year, he played against an English college team here in the States, and he credits that victory with being part of the reason he was chosen for Team USPA. “ … we beat them pretty good,” he admits.

The opportunity provided by being on Team USPA was fantastic, and playing with 10-goaler Tommy Biddle was eye-opening. “Tommy is incredible,” Uretz says. “Every pass we hit, he picked up and scored right away. He worked for the team, not just himself, he is a true sportsman.”

Will Tankard echoes that sentiment: “The Team USA program has changed my whole life. I was selling insurance and riding at 5 a.m. and after work. This program offered me the resources to be trained by the best people. The program will help you find work and is like a workout partner—by keeping tabs on you it makes you want to do more.

Being able to play with Tommy Biddle, having this opportunity available to me with access to top players like Tommy, Julio Arellano and Adam Snow, well, it is something you can not replicate on your own. Money can not buy this, and I am honored to be a part of it.”

Kris Bowman, executive director of Polo Development LLC agrees. International exposure, and the amount of experience gained by playing international polo can not be replicated. Ed Armstrong selected the team, and was with them every step of the way,” she said.

Both Tankard and Uretz are members of Team USPA. Chef d’Equipe for the team, Ed Armstrong said, “The fact that both Will and Patrick are members of Team USPA was also instrumental in their selection. Team USPA has very strict requirements for the players that it selects and I knew they had been very well vetted.

As I worked with Dan Coleman of the Arena Committee and members of the International Committee, I explained my intention to select a master like Tommy Biddle and two young guns that could counter the well-disciplined style of the English players. This formula worked in spades!”

The trophy is named for the late Bryan Morrison, a music mogul who managed Pink Floyd, and published music by the Bee Gees, Wham and Geoge Michael among others. He was briefly president of the Ham Polo Club in London, where he learned to play polo, before starting his own club, The Royal County of Berkshire Polo Club. He died in 2008, at the age of 66, two years after a polo accident left him in a coma.

By Corneila Bernard Henderson
Photos © Tony Ramirez imagesofpolo.com

Gwen Rizzo contributed to this story