From July 23 to 29, 2023, the best Fistball players in the world will come to Mannheim. 800 days before the start of the Men’s World Championship, the City of Mannheim, the hosts International Fistball Association, the DFBL and TV 1880 Käfertal presented the official logo of the 2023 World Championship on the large video cube in Mannheim’s SAP Arena.

“Mannheim is a sports city and ball sports plays a major role in this. Mannheim is represented by teams in six of the 15 national ball sports leagues. That’s why I’m very pleased that the fourth Men’s Fistball World Championship to be held in Germany will take place in Mannheim and that we can expect 16 teams from different continents and more than 30,000 fans in our city. With the Fistball World Championships and the German national garden show (“BUGA”*= short for “Bundesgartenschau”), two major events will take place in Mannheim in 2023 at which we can present ourselves to our guests as a cosmopolitan, livable and sustainable city,” says Mannheim’s sports mayor Ralf Eisenhauer.

Verleger: “The World Championship will be different from what we have been used to”.

The unveiling of the event logo took place on the large video cube at Mannheim’s SAP Arena. “We are very pleased to present the official event logo 800 days before the start of the World Championship. Our logo is different than what people have been used to because the World Championship is also different than before. The final phase in the SAP Arena on natural lawn is extraordinary for Fistball as an outdoor sport. The different shapes and widths of the letters represent a Fistball playing field as well as the City of Mannheim and the teams that bring the field to life. The colors symbolize the organizers: red for Mannheim and the DFBL, blue for the IFA and both together are also present at TV Käfertal,” explains IFA President Jörn Verleger.

The striking shape of the letters is very impressive, but stimulates interest. For the first time, an own font was created for a Fistball world championship. “This font will run through the World Championships and has a high recognition value,” says Jörn Verleger.

In 2007, Lower Saxony hosted the Men’s Fistball World Championship in Germany for the last time. “16 years later – 2023 – seemed to us at TV Käfertal a good occasion to bring the IFA Men’s Fistball World Championships to Mannheim and thus once again to Germany. Hosting the Fistball World Championship will be an enrichment for the city of Mannheim. With the Fistball World Championship we can contribute to the fact that the BUGA in Mannheim will become a great event, when the City of Mannheim and the TV 1880 Käfertal may welcome guests from all over the world and far more than 30,000 spectators on the occasion of the world championship for 10 days in July 2023,” OC President Jörg Trinemeier is already looking forward to the major sporting event.

At the same time, the 2023 World Fistball Championships will feature a highlight that has never been seen before in the sport of Fistball. “After the preliminary round in the Rhine-Neckar Stadium, the games up to the final will be played in the SAP Arena. In a unique setting, the new Fistball world champion will then be determined – hopefully in front of a sold-out crowd – in front of more than 11,000 fans,” said Trinemeier.

Löwe: “The Fistball family is expecting a special week”

This special atmosphere also fuels a certain expectation, as the co-coach of the German national team Chris Löwe knows: “As the world’s largest Fistball federation, we certainly have a great expectation from our own ranks, especially since we now certainly have a different role in the ranking compared to 2007. Our own expectations of the organization, fans and media are also not exactly low. We have to take the impulses we give each other and turn them into positive energy. The team, the organizers, the federation and of course the Fistball family is expecting a special week.”

The national team players in attendance fully agreed with their coach. “The anticipation for the 2023 home World Championship in Mannheim is huge. For me, it’s especially special that the World Championship is only a few kilometers away from my home in Pfungstadt and that family and friends can be there live. It will certainly be a real witch’s cauldron that everyone involved will not forget in a hurry. We’ve won a lot with the national team in recent years, so you always have to set yourself new goals. The World Championship in your country makes it very easy to motivate yourself week after week in training,” knows Germany’s main attacker Patrick Thomas.

“A World Championship in your own country is a dream in itself for every athlete. The different venues as well as the BUGA 2023 in Mannheim, which will take place in parallel, will be a spectacular visitor magnet. I am looking forward to great World Championship days in the cosmopolitan city of Mannheim,” added defender Felix Klassen of TV 1880 Käfertal. With Klassen, Nick Trinemeier and Marcel Stoklasa, three Mannheim players have the chance to qualify for the World Championship squad.

Today in 800 days we celebrate the IFA 2023 Fistball Men’s World Championship in Mannheim (Germany). Learn more abour yesterday´s logo presentation in #mannheim on our MWC-website: https://t.co/1vUvN6Ir2q @fistballMWC #wearefistball #fistballmwc #800days #RoadToMannheim pic.twitter.com/mCj7RjtB8u

— News (@IFA_Fistball) May 13, 2021

The International Fistball Association (IFA) is pleased to announce the foundation of the Asia Fistball Association (AFA). Currently IFA has 13 member federations in Asia. Elected as President was Cheng Tsz-man (Ewing) from Hongkong, China. The further board members are representing Chinese Taipeh, India and Japan.

AFA was founded as a non-profit making and non-political organization to which membership is open to Asian countries and territories without regards to race, religion, color or creed.

The objectives of AFA are:
1. To promote, develop and raise the standard of Fistball in Asia;
2. To encourage and assist in the formation and development of governing Fistball bodies in the Asian countries and territories;
3. To establish and promote friendly relations among members of the Association;
4. To assist and support the development of programs in all aspects of Fistball in
member countries and territories;
5. To co-ordinate tournaments in Asia and to appoint committees and court officials in official tournaments;
6. To do all such other lawful things as may be incidental or may be deemed to be conducive to the attainment of these objectives, or any of them;
7. To employ the funds of the Association in such a manner as shall be deemed
expedient
8. To safeguard the interest of Members and of AFA as a regional body;
9. To execute all functions, which the IFA may delegate to the regional Association;
10. To work at all times within the Rules and Regulations of the IFA and accept as final the ruling of the Association in any matter.

The Board of Directors serve for a 2-year period.

The meeting was prepaired by IFA Development Dirctor Roger Willen together with Ewing Cheng and Heiz Chan from Hongkong, China.

IFA President Jörn Verleger chaired the meeting and the elections.

Currently IFA has 13 member federations in Asia. Some of them are very active like Japan, that participated in the latest World Championships in Switzerland or the 2019 founded member federation in Hongkong, China or the Fistball Federation Of India, which participated in the U18 World Championships 2017 in Germany.

Referring to the IFA Statues Secretary General Chris Oberlehner informed that member federations can establish regional associations under geographical aspects. To be recognised a regional association they should be composed of at least 5 member federations. After approval of the regional association the President is member of the IFA board.

Before the formal founding IFA Development Director Willen reported in the meeting about the IFA Development Program to support new nations and to promote existing nations continuously. The aim is to ensure the ongoing development of the new and existing associations in coordination with the regional associations and the Fistball Academy.

Furthermore, he promoted a regional “Fistball Ambassadors” concept to be established to expand existing associations and develop new ones in the region.

The new AFA Board of Directors is composed by a President, several Vice Presidents, a Honorary Treasurer and a Secretary General with a 2-year period of service.

Each (Vice) President can appoint an executive assistant to help themselves.

Each official member and provisional member can appoint a rightful person to attend the committee meetings.

After a brief introduction of each candidate the meeting elected the following representatives unanimously.

President: Cheng Tsz-man (Ewing), Hongkong, China
Deputy: Wong Kwun-fung (Brian)

Vice President: S.Kevin Anandaraj, India

Board Member from Hongkong, China: Chan Tik-hei (Heiz)
Deputy: Wu Chun-chung (Jojo)

Board Member from Chinese Taipeh: Lee,Po-Yi
Deputy : Lee Yung-Chang

Board Member from Japan: Waichiro Horiuchi

On behave of IFA President Verleger congratulated each and every one.

“IFA is happy to work together with the new established leadership. IFA has now three well established regional associations. After the founding of the European Fistball Association (EFA) and the Panamerican Fistball Association (PAFA) in 2015 this is a great development for Fistball. I would specially like to thank our friends in Hongkong, China, who have overtaken the lead to establish the association. This is remarkable as the federation in Hongkong, China was only established in 2019 and shows the dynamics of our Fistballer players,” said IFA President Joern Verleger. “Furthermore, I expect that we will have another regional association founded already in this year in Oceania with five member federations already present in that region.”

Finally the meeting agree the following AFA milestones:
• 2022: Continental Championship as a qualifying tournament for the 2023 World Championship in Germany
• 2023: U18 Continental Championship as a qualifying tournament for the 2024 U18 World Championship in Oceania
• 2025: The World Games Chengdu, China

The AFA Statues can be found here.

IFA Integrity Officers Theresa Eidenhammer and President Joern Verleger participated in today´s IOC – GAISF Safeguarding Workshop.

The objective of the workshop was to introduce the concept of environmental risk as a key component to the manifestation of abuse in the sports community and to stimulate IFs to consider the opportunity to take meaningful actions towards creating safe sporting environments through organisation risk assessments, mitigation strategies, education and awareness.

Athletes’ safety and wellbeing is a priority and a core value for IFA, in line with its IFA SAFE SPORT POLICY SAFEGUARDING ATHLETES AND PARTICIPANTS FROM DISCRIMINATION, HARASSMENT AND ABUSE. Within IFA, there is zero tolerance for discrimination, harassment, or abuse to safeguard the sport of Fistball against all forms of violence and discrimination as IFA cares for the security of the athletes and the spectators.

GAISF Vice President and AIMS President, Stephan Fox stated, “We must continue to take concrete actions, implement safe sport initiatives and create awareness. The Olympic movement must stand together promoting safe sport and protecting all our athletes and youth from any kind of harassment and abuse.”

The International Fistball Association (IFA) is pleased to announce that its Board of Directors has approved in its today´s meeting an updated version of its Strategic Plan for the period 2019-2023. This will be IFA´s roadmap for the upcoming two years and reflects the COVID-19 crises as recently approved IOC Agenda 2020+5. This was preceded by extensive consultation as well as the IFA Policy Forum on March 30, 2021 and a resolution by the IFA Athletes Forum on April 17, 2021. The IFA 2019-2023 Strategic Plan can be found here.

“The IFA board and officials will be using this strategic plan to guide our decisions over the next years,” said IFA President Joern Verleger. “We see it as a working document that will help us make explicit decisions about our activities and priorities based on strategic considerations.”

“Our updated plan for the period 2019-2023 spells out our vision and values, our core strategies, and the steps for achieving them,” added Verleger.

IFA has also updated partially its Mission Statement, which says now “We encourage gender equity and diversity in all aspects.”

IFA has outlined strategic goals:
• High quality IFA events;
• Governance structures according to good governance principles;
• IFA serves as service-oriented organisation for its member federations providing real stakeholder value;
• Use of international platforms and participation in international multisport events serves as showcase for Fistball;
• Increase youth appeal of Fistball.

For each of the strategies, from 10 to 25 concrete steps are outlined.

This document is the “fourth” totally reviewed strategic plan and the first major update of the current strategic plan reflecting the COVID-19 pandemic and the IOC Agenda 2020+5. The first IFA Strategic Plan was adopted for the period 2011 – 2015 and resulted in strong growth of the membership of IFA to 54 member federations. The second Strategic Plan was for the period of 2016-2019 and resulted in a significant expansion of the organization’s visibility. Starting with 61 member federations the third Strategic Plan was initially approved for the period of 2019-2023. The IFA now has 67 member associations.

The worldwide COVID19 pandemic is once again changing the international Fistball calendar. Following the cancellation of the 2021 World Tour, the previously planned 2021 World Tour Finals must now also be postponed to 2022. After it was already clear that the location would be moved from South America to Europe, the potentially most promising substitute host had to withdraw their support.

“We are very disappointed to be forced to postpone the World Tour Finals once again. We did everything possible to hold the event in compliance with all necessary safety measures. In the end, it was not possible to get all the necessary partners on board in the short time available,” says IFA Secretary General Christoph Oberlehner.

As the Corona pandemic spread, the difficulties in hosting this event began. First, Birmingham (USA), the original host of the highest Fistball club competition, had to cancel and was also unable to host the event in 2021 due to scheduling problems. Then the replacement host from Porto Alegre (BRA) also had to withdraw their bid due to the notoriously difficult situation in Brazil.

Difficult search for alternative locations

As a result, IFA was in close contact with several possible replacement locations in Europe. On 1 March the 16 qualified teams were informed of the current status of the event in a video conference. At the same time, they were asked whether a bubble solution was desired as an emergency option. As this was confirmed by an overwhelming majority, IFA held further intensive talks with potential hosts.

“At the end of last week, we had to take note that the most promising host had to withdraw their pledges of support at short notice,” says Oberlehner. “Therefore, our only option is to postpone the World Tour Finals until next year, as the financial and organizational risks were too high.”
In addition, there are still so many uncertainties (e.g. travel restrictions) especially for the teams from Brazil, Chile and the USA.

“We really wanted to send a positive signal for international club Fistball with the organization of the Finals, but we must accept that club teams remain without an international competition this year. However, despite all the disappointment at the moment, we are already looking forward to 2022 with joy and want to offer a Fistball festival to the participating teams,” Winfried Kronsteiner, Chairman of the IFA Sports Commission, looks forward to next year’s event with confidence.

Participating teams are also qualified for 2022

The teams that have qualified via the World Tour and via the continental events are automatically qualified for the 2022 Finals. The host city and the exact event date will be announced as soon as all details have been agreed with the organizers. Planned event dates are the end of September in Europe or October in South America.

The Fistball event at the 7th TAFISA World Sport for All Games from the 18th to the 24th of June will be virtual as the event will be exclusively online.

More information to be published soon.

As the organisers informed us today the current situation the world is facing makes it necessary for the Organising Committee of the 7th TAFISA World Sport for All Games 2021 to restructure the event (rather than postponing again) – in alignment with the pandemic guidelines of the Portuguese Government that are in force and with the approval of the TAFISA Board of Directors.

The dates remain the same from the 18th to the 24th of June, but the event will be a virtual event, exclusively online in streaming and broadcast to the whole world.

While this brings us new challenges, the health and safety of all participants comes first. This new format will allow for broader virtual participation from all over the world and with no registered delegations/organisations to physically attend the World Games.

“We call for your collaboration and participation in this new online festival and innovative TAFISA event model, so that it is possible to show the world your countries, cultures and sports.” says TAFISA.

Today, 10 April the 2nd IFA Athletes Forum on the main topic “Women in Fistball” adopted after an interesting discussion the a resolution.

The IFA Athletes´ Commission under the leadership of chairwomen Katharina Lackinger prepared the 2nd IFA Athletes´ Forum. Main topic was “Women in Fistball”. The forum was covered on IFA Facebook page as well as MS Teams meeting.

The main question of this year´s forum was how we can make Fistball more attractive especially for girls/women. Several members of the IFA Athletes´ Commission made a point of statement during the forum.

IFA Secretary General Christoph Oberlehner presented a short comparison between women’s and men’s world championships as a fact check. In addition, athletes Celina Traxler, Tanja Bognar, Eric Kindler, Karin Kempinger, Sabine Suffert or Nick Trinemeier, among others, gave a speech.

In case you missed forum we provide you the recording of the session. Thank you to all our speakers.

A welcome message was given by Diane Huffman, President of WomenSport International (WSI). The Canadian is senior advisor for the Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee and Confederation of Sports. Her focus is partnership, organizational and policy development particularly related to influencing safe participation of girls and women in sport.

Furthermore, IFA presented its first ever Gender Equity Toolkit, that provides information about gender equity, as well as ideas / strategies especially for Fistball event organizers for consideration in order to stage events that are more gender equitable.

“Gender equity is a global topic across all areas of our lives, including Fistball”, says IFA President Jörn Verleger. “Achieving gender equity in Fistball will take time and patience. Taking a step-by-step process from start thinking about what it means over starting a conversation to implementing a strategy to promote gender equity is a long journey but it is necessary and it is worth to start this journey.”

“We would like to specially thank the World Flying Disc Federation and its WFDF Women in Sport Commission for allowing us to adopted their developed Gender Equity Toolkit for Fistball”, he added.

In 2017 WFDF and IFA signed a Memorandum of Understanding to cooperate on many fields as Sustainability, Anti-Doping, Ethics and Good Governance or Para-Sport activities.

An new IFA Gender Equity Quiz is online on https://tinyurl.com/ifagender

Today, IFA stands alongside the World Anti-Doping Agency on #PlayTrueDay 2021.

Our Anti Doping Officer Theresa Eidenhammer explains what clean sports means for her.

Say no to doping and listen to the message of U18 national team player Helena Schuh from Austria.

What does “Play True” mean to YOU?

Since 2014, in April of every year, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the anti-doping community worldwide have celebrated ‘Play True Day’ – a day that is dedicated to Clean Sport and is intended to raise awareness among athletes, the sporting public and others about the importance of protecting Clean Sport.

More:https://www.wada-ama.org/en/what-we-do/play-true-day

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Don’t miss any news and be always informed about what’s happening in fistball!

To celebrate the International Day of Sport for Development and Peace on 6 April, the IFA joins the #WhiteCard campaign to highlight the power of sport to overcome challenges and positively impact our lives

Sport has the power to change the world; it is a fundamental right, a powerful tool to strengthen social ties and promote sustainable development and peace and well as solidarity, and respect. Through our unique individual skills and collective power, we can come together and share creative ways to improve our health and well-being through sport and physical activity.

This day is commemorated globally each year by international, regional, national sport and develop-ment organizations to honor the role that sport plays in society, whether by encouraging healthier life-styles, making sport more widely accessible or using it as a vehicle for development in areas made vulnerable by conflict, poverty and inequality.

Since 2014 the Peace and Sport Foundation developed the #WhiteCard Campaign as a sign of your commitment to peace efforts worldwide.

Join the global movement, share your story and send a message of unity and solidarity! #IDSDP #OnlyTogether @peaceandsport

More:https://www.peace-sport.org/about-us/whitecard/