The China Floorball Federation (CFF) became an IFF member in June. Now they´ve organised a China Floorball Development Forum and are raising awareness of the sport.
The CFF organised a China Floorball Development Forum in Harbin, China from the 15th to the 17th of July. The Forum was organised in order to popularise the sport in China and bring together the different floorball groups in the country. The Forum was arranged in connection to the Comics festival in Harbin.
-In connection to the forum there was also a Floorball tournament organised in which 8 university teams took part, where the final was played between two Shanghai teams, which have had the longest exposure to Floorball. The tournament and the team tactics coaching seminar organised adjacent to the Forum were real successes, as they gathered a lot of publicity. So far there are around 70 clubs and other entities that have joined the CFF, says Mr. Shao Yunsheng, CFF vice president.
The Floorball Forum was attended by a number of high ranked Chinese sport officials from the General Administration of Sport of China, through Mr. Ren Hongguo, Director General for Winter sports, who felt that Floorball will very well fit into the plans of the Chinese preparations for the Beiging 2022 Winter Olympics and the popularisation of the winter sports in general. The Chinese NOC has placed Floorball together with Ice hockey, as they see the sports being very close to each other and supporting the learning of both sports. This vies was supported by the Vice president of the Chinese Ice hockey Mr. Xing.
Also the Mayor of Harbin Mr. Zhang Xianyou, who addressed the Forum felt that China has a bright future in Floorball and the City and the Harbin Sports Bureau are looking to apply for an international Floorball Event in Harbin prior to the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, as a part of the preparations for the games and rising the awareness for team sports.
During the Forum also two panel sessions were held, one on the development of Floorball in China and the directions for this, with participants from The Beijing Sport University, China Ice hockey federation, CFF, IFF and Unihoc. In the second panel discussion the marketing of the sport was discussed and how to popularise it and secure sufficient material resources for schools. The sport will now be promoted to three different target groups, primary schools, high schools and universities, with already over 40 projects in Harbin and more is to follow. CFF has also started cooperation with the IFF partners Unihoc and Gerflor, which both presented their products and services in the forum
The coaching seminar held, was also the start to build a set of more professionally educated National level coaches and building an educational structure for the CFF. The idea is still to have these around 30 coaches to spread the sport and train new coaches on a National level. The objective of the seminar was to teach the participants the concepts of game transition, attack and defensive tactics and most importantly – how to build practices to teach others the same concepts.
The 30 participants involved were quick to pick up the skills and were highly interactive during the three-day seminar. They showed good knowledge and application in the building of practices, indicating successful learning of the things taught during the seminar and passed a test of building defensive and fore-checking drills in the end of the seminar.
The CFF president Ms. Zhang Jing concluded that the Forum had been a true success, with a direct sent TV broadcast, with visibility at the Chinese Comic Festival, and the approval of the Chinese National Sport Administration and the Sports Community. The next task for the CFF will be to present the sport at the Chinese Sports Fair in Xi’an in end of July to all the regional Sports Bureaus and the school sport directors.
