General Information

Do you know Torball? Have you ever watched this acoustic game?

Torball is a ball game, developed in the 1970's for blind and visually impaired people. Torball is an intensive team sport for blind and visually handycapped persons. The game suits men and women of all ages. There are lots of facilities in this game for rehabilitation activities as well as leisure, school and top level sport.

Torball is played on a rectangular court of 16 m in length and 7 m in width. On the court are six players from two teams, i.e. three players per team. A goal is erected at either end of the rectangular court. The game is played with a bell ball, wich must be thrown underneath three cords tightened across the court. The object of the game is for each team to throw the ball across the opponent´s goal line while the other team attemps to prevent this from happening. Then, the former defending team takes on the attacking play and former attackers in turn defend their goal.

A particularity of the game is the ball, wich weights only 500 grams and is pumped up with air. Its qualities allow to play very tricky and fast. Torball demands for the ability of concentration and reaction by the players. Torball has got what it takes to spread even further and become a paralympic sport. Torball is a speedy and dynamic game. It is enormously popular specially in countries in Central Europe and in Latin America. Thus it is also played on the other Continents, Asia, African and Oceania. Torball is presumedly played in about 30 countries by almost 1'200 persons.

The origin of the game is not totally clear. The game known as Torball today was developed in the 1970s on the basis of Goalball (then known as Torball), wich in turn is based on Rollball. As a result there were two varieties of Torball in central Europe. The older version was played with a ball that weighted two kilograms and was later called Goalball (the English translation of the German name Torball), whereas the younger one used a ball of 500 grams and kept the name Torball. Last but not least as an acoustic game Torball can also been played by sighted people, though not as an IBSA sport. So, when will YOU start playing Torball?