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How it’s like to organize the Renew Cup | Kimmo blogs

Kimmo Vallema blogs about his floorball experiences in Germany. Want to know more about him? Click here to read his introduction article.

I. NEED. SLEEP.

“I survived… well, I and some thirty other volunteers like me practically lived and breathed floorball. When the sun was shining outside, we were busy in two different sports halls in Kaarst putting up a show called “Renew Cup”.

As mentioned before, there were some 10 Unihoc/Zone-teams that got together to do some testing for the upcoming seasons. The teams were primarily from the 1st and 2nd Bundesliga but there was also a team from the Netherlands participating. As far as I understand, this was some kind of a pre-selection team prior to them announcing the official national team later this week.

READ – Preseason preparations: practice games and tournament

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The voluntary-team, having worked tirelessly for the months prior, finally got together a few days before to iron out work-schedules and tasks and as Friday came about, we had a good overview on how we wanted things to run. So off we were to set up the two halls already on Friday to ensure timely start of the tournament on Saturday at 10.00.

It’s not that easy

By the way, anyone who thinks that setting up a tournament for a couple of hundred players spanning over two days is easy, is welcome to try it. I can guarantee it that it is not as easy as it sounds. It is a little bit more than just setting up the field and turning the match-clock on. Questions like “Is there enough toilet-paper?”, “How and where do we wash plates?”, “How many bottles of beer do we need?” and millions more will have to be tackled.

Without going to every single game in detail – because we would be here until season 20-21 – I have to say the tournament offered everything: drama, excitement, surprises, but mostly a lot of fun. It was SSF Dragons Bonn and Dümptener Füchse to battle out in the final.

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Time to relax

Surprising results

Even if all the teams in the tournament are still very much in a testing-modus, trying out new players, new tactics, new skills… it was still perhaps a little surprising that the perennial Top-3 team in 1st Bundesliga Wernigerode ended up fifth in the tournament and the hosts DJK Holzbüttgen third respectively. Both teams still have some way to go before the set up for the opening games in some 2-3 weeks is finally ready.

Unfortunately, I did not have much time to chat with the different teams, but for DJK Holzbüttgen we can certainly call this a successful tournament. The team of volunteers putting up the show did a remarkable job and the tournament ran flawlessly from start to end. We had hardly any delays over the two days.

A great success for DJK Holzbüttgen

As for the playing team of DJK, the tournament, despite narrowly missing the final, the tournament was a resounding success. We were able to muster a squad of twenty players to every game and all of them managed to get some time on the field. This included our new young talent. In the game against Dümpten we managed to field a 14-year old, two 15-years olds and a 16-year old and they alongside some veterans put on a valiant effort to push the 2nd Bundesliga team.

In the final, it seemed that Dümpten was slightly overwhelmed in the end as Bonn ran over them with a decisive 11-0 victory. This certainly will give a boost for Dragons for the upcoming first season in the 1st Bundesliga.

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Team Holland

Referees

One additional group that certainly deserves a special mention is the brave group of Referees. We had four pairs of two referees working tirelessly in the two halls through all of the games. As this was at the same time a “training-event” for them, they certainly had to go through a baptism of fire.

The group was a mixed bunch of more experienced Bundesliga referees but also some “newbies” trying their skills for the first time on a Bundesliga-level. Between the games, the referees then got reviewed by their trainers and were offered feedback. All things considered, they did a remarkable job and even if some of the games turned more heated than they perhaps were used to, they were able to keep their heads cool and come out better for it. Well done and thank you!

Slightly different game-format

About the game-format: the games were played 3x15min with five-minutes breaks with running clock, except for the last three minutes of the last period. This means that a single game was likely to be about 65-70min. As the games were planned to start every 75min, it certainly kept me busy running between the teams to have them fill the forms and “oh by the way…you only have five minutes on the field to warm-up” – but still we managed to pull it off.

Unfortunately, the 75min schedule is something we had to do in order to not have a night-tournament all of a sudden. In the end, we even had time to enjoy a nice grill-evening with nearly all of the teams and have a little pub-quiz outside over some good food and drinks.

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Team Holland

Perhaps for the tournaments in the years to come, it would be an idea to revisit the rule of “first points, then direct comparison, then goal-difference”. Perhaps it is just my disappointment on missing the final ;)… but it was a bit funny feeling that we missed on the final having the same points, goal difference of +13 against their -5, and still missing out… but rules are rules! All respect to Dümpten, they won their game against us and therefore deserved their place in the final.

The end-results

  1. SSF Dragons Bonn
  2. Dümptener Füchse
  3. DJK Holzbüttgen
  4. Blau-Weiß Schenefeld
  5. Red Devils Wernigerode
  6. Eiche Horn Bremen
  7. TSV Tollwut Ebersgöns
  8. PSV 90 Dessau
  9. Rennsteig Avalanche
  10. Team Holland

So all in all, it was a fun couple of days. Got to see a lot of floorball. Feel pretty happy about our own team for the coming season. Got some great feedback from the participating teams, so good fun was had by all!

Thank you, everyone, that made it possible, sponsors, the volunteers, the teams, the faithful fans, the referees. In the meanwhile: I am off to bed! Don’t wake me up unless Mika Kohonen wants to sign up with DJK Holzbüttgen….. or Peter Kotilainen! 🙂

Cheers,
Kimmo”

Kimmo Vallema

Any thoughts about floorball in Germany? Or questions you’d like to ask Kimmo? Let us know by sending an email to hello@floorballtoday.com or contacting us through social media!

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