Australian water polo star Tilly Kearns is one of the biggest personalities to watch at the Olympics in Paris this month. She will not look forward to playing China in the opening round of pool play on Saturday!
The Chinese side is apparently known to be especially vicious in the pool.
Kearns, a 23-year-old centre forward for Team Australia, hails from Sydney and plays for USC on the collegiate level. Her birth name is Matilda but she goes by Tilly.
Part of what makes Kearns so endearing, beyond her vivacious personality, is her behind-the-scenes content from a sport that most people don’t know all that much about. She has nearly 500,000 followers on TikTok because of her ability to bring water polo to the mainstream through fun and entertaining human interest stories.
However, when it comes to playing against China, “fun” might be the wrong word.
Kearns’ most viral video showed the aftermath of a match against the Chinese side around this time last year. Her chest was scarred with numerous nasty scratches from the nails of her opponents.
It was not a one-time thing! Australia warmed up for the Olympics with some (not-so) friendly training matches against China in the spring.
Kearns, once again, had scratches all over her body.
She tried her best to prevent additional scratches but the efforts failed.
Every athlete’s fingernails and toenails must be trimmed prior to a match so that scratches of this nature are kept to a minimum. It doesn’t always work, clearly, and there is no other method of prevention!
Women’s water polo will commence at the Olympics this weekend. Australia opens up competition on Saturday against its first Group A opponent, China.
Tilly Kearns could not be more excited. She obviously loves playing against the Chinese side!
Who wouldn’t enjoy getting scratched across the chest for 40-straight minutes??