IFF Central Board held its fourth meeting of the year from 2nd–3rd November in Helsinki, Finland. On Saturday the 2nd of November in the CB working session, the CB discussed and updated the documents for the upcoming General Assembly, Strategy Implementation, and new Event Structure in addition to other topics. The actual meeting took place on Sunday the 3rd of November.
IFF General Assembly 2024
The IFF has by the deadline received one nomination for the presidency and 14 nominations for the members of the IFF Central Board. In addition, one nomination for the chair of the Disciplinary Committee and eight members and one nomination for the chair of the Appeal Committee and six members. For the IFF Ethics Commission there are nominations for the chair and four members. The office also received three motions from IFF members Cote d’Ivoire, Sweden and Ukraine. The CB worked on the General Assembly topics on Saturday in the working session and according to the IFF statutes, the documents together with the final announcement, need to be sent to the IFF members latest by the 14th of November 2024. The actual IFF General Assembly takes place on the 14th of December 2024 in Malmö, Sweden.
Strategy Implementation
The Strategy Implementation Report from Phase 1 (2021—2024) consists of a short description of how the implementation plan has been built, using the four Strategy Key Priority subgroups, which built the plan for the specific suggested actions. The Implementation plan has been overseen by the Strategy Working Group (SWG) and the concrete work has been done by the IFF CB, the Committees and the Office. Further the report highlights a few Targets from each Key Priority Area.
The SWG is working on a proposed working plan for how to go ahead with the Phase 2 of the Strategy Implementation, which will start in the beginning of 2025.
New Event Structure
The information meeting on the new Event Structure was held on the 9th of October. The information meeting had some 77 participants from over 35 countries, the IFF Central Board and the IFF Office. The participants were asked to provide their feedback to the IFF by the 23rd of October. IFF received feedback from a total of 22 member federations (Australia, Austria, Benin, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Kenya, Latvia, Liechtenstein, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Singapore, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and USA). The general response was positive, but with some questions and general comments, for example questions on how to get from one WFC to the next.
Athletes’ Commission
The Athletes’ Commission is looking forward to the upcoming election. The ATC members are elected for a term of 4 years and the elections will be held during the Men’s WFC 2024 and the Women’s WFC 2025 Qualifications. Elections are open to all countries who have registered for WFC events in the last ATC period (2022-2025). Via the elections, the players themselves (maximum of 20 votes per country) will elect a minimum of six representatives (3 men and 3 women), and the IFF CB has the option to select one member of each gender based on regional aspects. All voting will be done online (Webropol Survey).
The results of the Men’s election won’t be public until the Women’s election takes place so that the whole ATC team can be announced at the same time. There are in total eight male candidates.
Upcoming events
Men’s WFC 7th — 15th December 2024 in Malmö, Sweden
On October 28th, there were still 2.500 weekend packages and some sky boxes for sales. Over 6.200 tickets have been sold directly to the floorball clubs. The total ticket sales of between 35.000 – 40.000 tickets so far, 56% has been sold to Sweden, 17% to Switzerland, 6% to Denmark, 5% to Finland and around 4% to Czech Republic, Norway, and Germany. Some 5% have been sold to the rest of the World. So far, the “Little WFC” school project has resulted in having over 11.000 pupils have been introduced to Floorball in their PE lessons. As a part of this project some 7.500 tickets have been ordered.
This event will also act as the qualification for The World Games 2025, with the Top 5 European teams and the highest placed AOFC team qualifying. As Canada are the only team from AMER in the WFC they have, by default, also automatically qualified for TWG 2025.
Men’s U19 WFC 29th April — 4th May 2025 in Zurich, Switzerland + 3v3 WFC 2025
The ballot was successfully held in the Swiss Life Arena. So far, the 66% of the sponsoring budget (135.000 CHF) has been reached, now including TICKETMASTER as a Main Sponsor. The ticket sales system has also been agreed upon with IFF. Discussions are ongoing for the TV broadcast with TV24 and one Swiss Media house. The LOC is running an extensive promotion campaign and approaching ice hockey fans and a Street Floorball Event in beginning of April 2025.
Qualifications
The AOFC qualification was played from 20th – 22nd September in Honiara, Solomon Islands, and was a great success, with Australia and Singapore qualifying. The Solomon Islands men’s national team played two friendly internationals (against New Zealand and Singapore), a mini game against Japan and had a joint training session with Australia. This format of a new federation hosting a small event like this, even though they were not directly involved in the competition, was very beneficial. It provided a great opportunity for the Solomon Islands Floorball Federation to showcase the sport for their government sport agencies, sponsors, and spectators. A two-day development seminar was also run before the actual tournament took place.
The EUR1 qualification was played in Pruszcz, Poland from 4th – 8th September, with Estonia and Spain qualifying for the final round. This is the first time that Spain has qualified for this event.
It is now confirmed that the EUR2 qualification will be played in Latisana, Italy, at the same time as the Women’s EUR2 qualification. The teams from both events will stay in the one accommodation site in Lignano Sabbiadoro. This will be a great practice run for the Italian Federation before the Women’s U19 WFC in 2026, as this will be the same venues and accommodation site used for that event.
Women’s WFC 6th — 12th December 2025 in Brno & Ostrava, Czech Republic
Ticket sales planned to start around the time of the Men’s WFC 2024.
Qualifications
The AOFC qualifications have now been confirmed to be played in Singapore, at Our Tampines Hub, with 8 teams from 18th – 22nd March 2025. This event will also act as the Women’s AOFC Qualification for TWG 2025, with the two best teams qualifying.
The Americas qualifications will be played in Austin, Texas, USA from 8th – 10th March 2025.
Men’s WFC 2028
The Czech Floorball has in writing applied for the organisation of the IFF Men’s WFC 2028. The IFF Office proposes that IFF will before appointing the Czech Floorball as the organiser agree upon the basic requirements for the organiser before starting the bid. This will be done as a proposal to the IFF CB meeting in December.
EuroFloorball Cup & EuroFloorball Challenge
The decision has been taken by the IFF CB that all the IFF club competitions needs to undergo a full review after the conclusion of Champions Cup 2025, and the IFF Competition department has proposed that the EuroFloorball Cup & EuroFloorball Challenge events already be removed from the 2025 calendar until the review is completed. The CB decided in the previous meeting that the IFF Office should still try to look for potential organisers for these events, to have them still played in 2025.
SEA Games 2025 Thailand
Floorball is in for the next upcoming SEA Games. The host city contract was signed in early June. The SEA Games (9th—20th of December 2025) clashes directly with the WFC, so the teams playing in both will have to go directly after the WFC to the SEA Games. It will be important for the IFF and Floorball Thailand to co-ordinate with the SEA Games LOC the dates that Floorball will be played at the SEA Games to allow for the move from one event to the next.
