What is Team Handball?

Team handball can best be described as water polo, minus the water, with elements of basketball and soccer. The game is a blend of speed, grace, skill and raw, athletic power on offence and tough, physical resistance to that speed and skill on defense. This gritty action likens it to popular spectator sports like hockey and football.

Team handball is aggressive and fast-paced, with up-and-down flow and wild action around the goal, not to mention rugged, fearless play, elements which cause proponents to baffle over the sport's small following in Canada.

"Team handball is a very physical sport," says Warren Poncsak, a Regina-based coach of Canada's men's handball team at the 1999 Pan Am Games. "At an adult level, it's a controlled contact sport, where the defense tries to contain or absorb the offensive player's momentum. But it's a clean sport - the contact that is allowed is face-to-face. You can't hit from behind or from the side."

Australian rules football fans should find much to appreciate in team handball players - all of whom take the speed and bruising of a full-contact sport without protection. As such, players need not only a great deal of agility, flexibility, energy, strength, speed and endurance. They also need to be tough with strong joints that can withstand the exertion and the pounding.

Physicality and contact aside, Team Handball is a game of movement and flow. A team's success depends on its ability of a team to move the ball and attack effectively on offense and work efficiently on defense.

Click here to download the rules of the IHF (International Handball Federation)