ITHF table hockey

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Table hockey being played
Table hockey being played

Table hockey is a sport played on table hockey games. The origin of the sport was the Swedish Championship 1982 in Upplands Väsby. Organized table hockey is played in Northern, Central and Eastern Europe, in North America and in Japan.

The World Championship is organized by the International Table Hockey Federation every two years. The Stiga Play Off game is the official game of the Table Hockey World Championship.

Sweden has dominated the table hockey scene from the beginning and a couple of years into the new millennium. Until the Finnish gold in Rīga 2005, Sweden had won all Team World Championships, until 2006 only Swedes had won the Open Swedish Masters, and until 2007 all individual world champions were Swedes. But the new generation comes from Finland, Russia, the Czech Republic and Latvia, and its current big star is 17 years old Roni Nuttunen from Finland who in the past season won all major tournaments he participated in, including the two greatest: Swedish Masters and the world championships.

Since the sport expands quickly in many countries, the table hockey map may have to be redrawn within a couple of years when nations other than the big six (Sweden, Finland, Russia, Czech Republic, Norway and Latvia) produce new talents.

Contents

[edit] World Championship History

Year Location Winner No. of Participants
1989 Stockholm, Sweden Mikael Kratz, SWE 42 (7 nationalities)
1992 Brno, Czechoslovakia Jacob Lindahl, SWE 32 (5 nationalities)
1993 Paris, France Anders Ekestubbe, SWE 61 (9 nationalities)
1995 Stockholm, Sweden Jacob Lindahl, SWE 66 (8 nationalities)
1997 Helsinki, Finland Hans Österman, SWE 61 (9 nationalities)
1999 Wilhelmshaven, Germany Stefan Edwall, SWE 71 (15 nationalities)
2001 Plzen, Czech Rep. Hans Österman, SWE 100 (16 nationalities)
2003 Zurich, Switzerland Daniel Wallén, SWE 102 (19 nationalities)
2005 Riga, Latvia Hans Österman, SWE 132 (22 nationalities)
2007 Moscow, Russia Roni Nuttunen, FIN 117 (19 nationalities)
2009 Budapest, Hungary

[edit] European Championship History

Year Location Winner No. of Participants
1990 Lund, Sweden Jörgen Sundqvist, SWE 63 (9 nationalities)
1992 Brno, Czechoslovakia Mikael Kratz, SWE 75 (5 nationalities)
2006 Skalica, Slovakia Alexey Zakharov, RUS 111 (17 nationalities)
2008 Riga, Latvia

[edit] World Club Championship History

Year Location Winning team No. of teams
2007 Oslo, Norway Enköping HSC, SWE 20 (7 nationalities)

[edit] World Table Hockey Tour

For the season 2003-2004 six of the biggest tournaments formed a league called Euroleague. The tournaments were Helsinki Open, Oslo Open, Riga Cup, SM (Huskvarna), Moscow Open and Czech Open (Plzen).

The following season Boston Challenge was also included. The other tournaments remained, but SM was played in Stockholm and Czech Open in Pribram.

For the season 2005-2006 the league changed name to World Table Hockey Tour, and was expanded to 13 tournaments. The new ones were Öresund Cup (Elsinore), Gatineau Challenge, Stiga Las Vegas, Budapest Open, Bratislava Open and Berlin Open. In the original six tournaments, the players were awarded higher points than in the other. SM was played in Eskilstuna and Czech Open in Prague.

The 2006-2007 season of the World Table Hockey Tour included the following tournaments:

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

[edit] Federations

[edit] Others