Date: 4 -6 June 2010

Location: Hurlingham Park, Hammersmith

Last weekend saw Hurlingham Park transformed into a 22,000 seated arena for Mint Polo In The Park, Polo’s equivalent to the football world cup.

The park, labelled the spiritual home of polo was completely unrecognisable from the location I had visited only one month ago for An afternoon playing Polo. Instead of a public park with a temporary arena the venue resembled a hybrid design of a music festival and cup final day of a major sporting tournament.

Friday’s event saw three games of Polo played, the first fixture saw Team Otkritie Moscow face Team City AM New York in a fiercely competed battle which saw the Polo ponies flying around the pitch at around 45 Miles Per Hour chasing a Chukka (ball) which was travelling at around 100 MPH.

Having never seen Polo played in the flesh before I wasn’t sure what the score line would be like in this match (although I had found out that if you scored outside the area, you got two points, one point for a goal inside the area, like Basketball)

The game between Moscow and New York in the end finished 9 – 10 to New York with Jamie Morrison scoring a last gasp winner to cap a fantastic fight back from Team New York.

As Team New York progressed to the semi finals the crowd descended onto to the pitch to partake in the Treading The Divots tradition, which sees the audience act as the ground staff to help return the pitch to a divot free playing surface.

Two further quarter finals rounded off the Polo on Friday with IG Index Team Paris defeating Gaucho Team Buenos Aires 9 – 8 and MINT Team London loosing to Thomson Reuters Team Geneva 8 – 13.

Friday’s event set the tone for the entire weekend which saw Team City AM New York lift the Mint Polo In The Park trophy on Sunday as winners after team captain Jack Kidd scored a last minute goal to win the game 11 – 10 over IG Index Team Paris.

Polo In The Park hopes to bring Polo to the masses in the same way that 20/20 Cricket has revolutionised the historic sport and if Polo In The Park is anything to go by, this event is only going to get bigger and bigger.