Rinkball

This article has multiple issues. Please help or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages) The topic of this article may not meet Wikipedia's general notability guideline. Please help to demonstrate the notability of the topic by citing reliable secondary sources that are independent of the topic and provide significant coverage of it beyond a mere trivial mention. If notability cannot be shown, the article is likely to be merged, redirected, or deleted. Find sources:  –  ·  ·  · scholar · JSTOR (February 2022) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) This article relies too much on references to primary sources. Please improve this by adding secondary or tertiary sources. (February 2022) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) Some of this article's listed sources may not be reliable. Please help this article by looking for better, more reliable sources. Unreliable citations may be challenged or deleted. (February 2022) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

Rinkball

Ball used in the sport of rinkball. The ball color is blue
Highest governing body	[1]
Nicknames
First played	1960s; 61 years ago (1960s), in Sweden
Characteristics
Type	Team sport Winter sport
Equipment	Bandy skates (most often) Ice hockey skates (less often) Blue bandy ball Rinkball sticks Protective gear
Venue	Ice rink
Presence
Country or region	Finland, Sweden
Olympic	No
Paralympic	No
World Games	No

Rinkball is a winter team sport played on ice with ice skates and is most popular in Finland, where it is known as kaukalopallo. This ball sport originated in Sweden in the 1960s and from there landed in Finland in the 1970s. Like rink bandy, it uses a bandy ball but a blue color is used instead of orange or cerise. Rinkball sticks are a sport specific design and are different from bandy sticks and ice hockey sticks. The goal is to score more goals than to opposing team.

Rinkball combines elements of bandy, rink bandy, and ice hockey, but is now a separately organized sport after developing its own organizing bodies, codifying its own rules, and having designed its own sport-specific equipment.

The sport's largest national organization is in Finland. The ,^[1] has 1,000 teams, including women, men and children. Play is divided into eight male divisions, two female divisions, and children's play is divided by age.^[2]

Rinkball rules[]

Rules for rinkball are set in Finland and there are also separate rules for the Championship Series.

The playing time is 3 × 20 minutes of effective playing time, ie the clock is stopped with game breaks (men's league and 1st division). In the lower series, the playing time is 2 × 30 minutes of running time. In that case, the clock will only be stopped during overtime or a penalty shot, or if there is a longer delay in the game ie. due to an injured player. Even in running time, the clock will be stopped during the last 2 minutes of the match for all interruptions.

The team may have a maximum of 17 or 20 players on their roster and two goalkeepers (depending on the series) of which one goalkeeper and five field players may be on the ice at a time. The team has the opportunity to pull and replace the goalkeeper with another player.

Rinkball equipment[]

The ball is 6 centimeters in diameter and weighs about 60 grams and is blue in color.

Mandatory equipment for field players includes a helmet, neck guard, skates and a stick.

Mandatory equipment for the goalkeeper involves skates, a helmet with a face shield or mask, a neck guard, and goalkeeper shin guards or knee pads (width up to 28 cm). The goalkeeper has a catch glove or “fin” in each hand, the palm of which must be able to be spread completely open, so that its diameter must not exceed 28 cm at any point. The maximum width of the bracelet is 15 cm. The goalkeeper does not have a stick.

Rinkball history[]

The sport was initially used as a practice drill for bandy players in Sweden who were using ice hockey rinks. The first Finnish championships were held in 1975. However, the sport didn't come to the attention of the wider public in Finland until the 1980s with the first Finland-Sweden national match played in 1984. In 1990, a match between the men's Finnish rinkball team and the newly crowned national Swedish bandy team champions resulted in a blowout with the Finland rinkball team winning 13–3. This event helped further the fact that the two sports, bandy and rinkball, had become very different games.^[3] The first World Rinkball Championship Games for men was held in Omsk, Russia, in 1998.^[4]

The (IRF) was founded in 1992 with Russia, Hungary and Switzerland among its first founding members, but Sweden, Norway, the United States and Canada did not join.^[3] By the late 1990s the international organization included Russia, Sweden, Kazakhstan, Estonia, Switzerland, Hungary, Finland and the United States.^[4]

The first World Rinkball Championship Games for men was held in Omsk, Russia, in 1998.^[4]

Notable players[]

Women[]

• Hanna-Riikka Sallinen (née Nieminen, previously Välilä; born 12 June 1973) – won the European Championship gold in rinkball in 1989.^[5]

References[]

External links[]

• (in Finnish) Finnish Rinkball Federation