I have done a large amount of motivational speaking over the years and depending on the audience have often used sporting anecdotes to illustrate the points I wanted to make.

Having just moved house recently I came across a folder with lots of notes, cuttings and and an old USB drive with lots of interesting stuff. I will share some of this from time to time but will always preface this with the words OFF TOPIC if you don’t want to read the rantings of Guru PIG.

Unfortunately I am unable to credit much of the material but will include in italics those words which I know are not mine.

Does sport transcend politics?

It is often said that sport has the capacity to transcend the petty bickering’s of men.

Alas, this is not always true, as I am old enough to remember, at the ripe old age of three, the 1956 Melbourne Olympics “Blood in the Water” water polo Semi-final match between the USSR and Hungary that was set against the background of the Hungarian revolution (the good guys won 4-0 – the water polo, not the uprising).

It was dubbed “Blood in the Water” and centres on a water polo match between Hungary and the Soviet Union. The match occurred just weeks after the Soviet invasion of Hungary, where hundreds of Hungarians were killed and thousands arrested.

The pro-Hungarian crowd at the Olympic pool saw numerous altercations and fights – including underwater headlocks – between the players. Late in the match, Ervin Zador, who had scored two goals for Hungary, was hit by Soviet player Valentin Prokopov and climbed out of the pool with blood streaming from his head. Spectators and Hungarian officials rushed toward the Russian team. Police and security intervened to protect them (more than what had been afforded the Hungarian people I may add), escorting the Soviet team from the pool.

Hungary, the defending gold medalists, won 4-0 and went on to take gold again with a 2-1 win over Yugoslavia.

Zador, who died in 2012, defected to the United States after the Olympics, along with about half of the 100-member Hungarian team.

“I deeply regret that picture,” he said in a 2008 interview. “I would have loved to be remembered as one of the best young players in the world, rather than the guy hit by the Russian.”

At the time, Zador was a 21-year-old college student. When the Hungarian revolt began, in October 1956, he and his teammates were training at a mountain camp outside Budapest. They could hear gunfire and could see puffs of smoke in the city. Before they could determine the outcome, they were bused out of the country and flown from Czechoslovakia to Melbourne. At the Olympic Village, Zador recalled, they were desperate for news. A water polo player who was fluent in English read a Melbourne newspaper and told his teammates what had happened: after freedom fighters had tried to overthrow the Soviet-dominated Communist regime and establish a democratic government, about 200,000 Russian troops poured across the Hungarian border, their tanks rumbling through the streets of Budapest. They left more than 5,000 people dead. The first thing the water polo players did in the Olympic Village was tear down the Hungarian flag with the Communist emblem and replace it with the banner of Free Hungary.

At the opening ceremony the Hungarian team marched on to the the Melbourne Cricket Ground to a standing ovation. Lead by the current Olympic Champion in the Hammer Throw, József Csermák, who proudly waved the Free Hungary Flag.

Before water polo games, the captains of the two teams customarily meet at poolside with the referee and shake hands. At the 1956 Olympics, the Hungarian captain refused to shake. The crowd of more than 5,000 people who crammed the Melbourne Olympic Pool was dominated by Hungarian expatriates, who shouted, “Hajra Magyarok!” (Go Hungarians!), waved flags and shouted epithets as the Soviet players were introduced. “We always had an extra incentive when we played the Soviets, but the atmosphere at Melbourne was another dimension,” Zador said. “The game meant so much to us. We had to win the gold medal. We were playing for ourselves, for our families back home, for our country.”

Having been lucky enough to represent my country at junior level I remember the huge emotion when you first go out on the arena and then stand while your national anthem is played. How much more emotion would the events of previous weeks and the partisan crowd have created for the Hungarian team. To be able to perform so well and totally “kick their ass” was a real credit to their professionalism and determination.

Ervin Zador did not play in the gold medal match, or ever again.

In a break of protocol the Melbourne Olympic Organising Committee decided to award him and all other members of his team who had played during the tournament a gold medal. This tradition continues today.

In 2008, when Zador read about activists disrupting the Olympic torch relay to protest China’s crackdown in Tibet, he was saddened.

“I wish sports could be exempt from politics,” he said. “But that’s just a dream. It’ll never happen.”