Flag Hockey Usa
Flag Hockey Usa
Underwater hockey (UWH; also called Octopush ) is a non-contact sport in which two teams compete to manoeuvre a puck across the bottom of a swimming pool into goals.
Equipment
Players wear a diving mask, swimfins and a snorkel for play. Safety gear includes ear protection usually in the form of a water polo cap, a mouthguard, and a glove for the playing hand (to protect against pool-bottom abrasion and, in some designs, knuckle protection against puck impact). Players may choose to wear a protective glove on both hands as the current rules permit a player to switch the stick between hands mid-play.
The stick is quite short (according to recent rules, not more than 350mm in length, including the handle) and is coloured white or black to indicate the player's team. In tournament play, the colour of the stick and cap are randomly assigned to each team before every game.
The puck is approximately the size of an ice hockey puck but is made of lead or similar material (Adult size weighs 3 lb (1.3-1.5 kg), Junior 1 3/4 lb (800-850 gm)) and is surrounded by a plastic covering, which is usually matched to the pool bottom to facilitate good grip on the stick face while preventing excessive friction on the pool bottom. The puck's weight brings it to rest on the pool bottom, though can be lifted during passes.
The goals {or 'gulleys') are three metres in width and are sited at opposite ends of the playing area on the pool bottom.
Play
Two teams of up to ten players compete, with six players on each team in play at once. The remaining four players are continually substituted into play from a substitution area, which may be on deck or in the water outside the playing area, depending on tournament rules.
Before the start of play the puck is placed in the middle of the pool, and the players wait in the water, touching the wall above the goals they are defending. At the start-of-play signal (usually a buzzer or a gong), in-play members of both teams are free to swim anywhere in the play area and try to score by manoeuvring the puck into the opponents' goal. Play continues until either a goal is scored, and players return to their wall to start a new point, or a break in play is signalled by a referee (whether due to a foul, a time-out, or the end of the period of play).
A typical playing formation is the 3-3 (three offensive players or forwards , and three defensive players or backs ). Other options include 2-3-1 ( i.e. , two forwards, three midfielders, and a back), 1-3-2, or 2-2-2. As important to tournament teams' formation strategy is the substitution strategy - substitution errors might result in a foul (too many players in the play area) or a tactical blunder (too few defenders in on a play).
There are a number of penalties described in the official underwater hockey rules, ranging from use of the stick against something (or someone) other than the puck, playing or stopping the puck with something other than the stick, and "blocking" (interposing one's self between a team-mate who possesses the puck and an opponent; one is allowed to play the puck, but not merely block opponents with one's body). If the penalty is minor, referees award an advantage puck - the team that committed the foul is pushed back 3 metres from the puck, while the other team gets free possession. For major penalties, such as a dangerous pass ( .e.g. , at or near an opponent's head) or intentional or repeated fouls, the referees may eject players for a specified period of time or the remainder of the game. A defender committing a serious foul sufficiently close to his own goal may be penalized by the award of a penalty shot or a penalty goal to the fouled player's team.
Games consist of two halves, typically ten to fifteen minutes in length (depending on tournament rules; 15 minutes at world championship tournaments) and a short half time interval. At half time the two teams switch ends.
Referees
Refereeing the game are two (or three) water referees (i.e. in the pool with full snorkelling gear, and wearing a distinctive cap, gloves and t-shirt) to observe and referee play at the pool bottom, and one or more poolside deck referees to track time (both in the period and for each ejected player), maintain the score, and call fouls (such as excessive number of players in play, failure to start a point from the end of the playing area, or another foul capable of being committed at or noticed at the surface). The deck (chief) referee responds to hand signals given by the water referees to start and stop play, including after an interruption such as a foul or time-out.
The Official Rules are available in PDF form without charge and define (with illustrations) a valid goal, the fouls and signals, and the dimensions of the playing area, sticks, and goals. The rules can be found at www.thewaa.org
Spectators
Underwater Hockey is not very spectator friendly. Since the action is all below the surface, one must enter the water to get the full effect of the game. Spectators may either try on fins, a snorkel, and mask and enter the pool for a view of the playing area, or take advantage of the work of underwater videographers who have recorded major tournaments. Major tournaments often have closed circuit live tv for the spectators which makes it a very exciting spectator sport. Organizers of major tournaments are usually the only contacts for acquiring recorded underwater hockey footage, and although no official worldwide repository exists for recorded games, there are many websites and instructional dvds.
Filming the games is challenging even for the experienced videographer, as the players' movements are fast and there are few places on the surface or beneath it which are free from their seemingly frenzied movements. Games are often played width-wise across a 50 metre pool to provide spaces in between simultaneous games for player substitutes, penalty boxes, coaches and camera crews. However, research and development of filming techniques is ongoing.
High level World Championship events, in recent years, have attempted video coverage of the games. Recent attempts during both the 2006 World Championship in Sheffield, England and the 2008 World Championship in Durban, South Africa even included online streamed footage, whilst the 2008 European Championship in Istanbul, Turkey had excellent video coverage but no live streaming.
History
The sport was invented in 1954 by Alan Blake of the newly formed Southsea Sub-Aqua Club and first played at the club by him and other divers including John Ventham, Jack Willis, and Frank Lilleker in Eastney Swimming Pool, Portsmouth, England. Originally called "Octopush" (and still known primarily by that name in the United Kingdom today) the original rules called for teams of eight players (hence "octo-"), a bat reminiscent of a tiny shuffleboard stick, called a "pusher" (hence the "-push"), an uncoated lead puck called a "squid", and a goal known at first as a "cuttle" but soon thereafter a "gully". The first rules were tested in a 1954 two-on-two game, and an announcement was made in the November 1954 issue of Neptune, the official newsheet of the British Sub-Aqua Club. The object of the game was to keep members of Southsea Sub-Aqua Club #9 from abandoning the new club during the winter months in which it was too cold to dive in the sea. The first octopush competition between clubs was a three-way tournament between teams from Southsea, Bournemouth and Brighton in early 1955. Southsea won then, and they are still highly ranked at a national level today.
The substantial changes in equipment, team size, and other factors have helped make the game the international sport it is today, with 44 teams from 17 countries competing at the 14th World Championship in 2006 at Sheffield in the United Kingdom, though sadly rather fewer teams and countries attended the more recent World Championship in 2008 at Durban in the Republic of South Africa.
Underwater hockey enjoys great popularity in the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, the USA, the Netherlands and France, as well as to a lesser extent in other countries such as Japan, the Philippines, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Serbia, Slovenia, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Turkey, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Singapore and Zimbabwe, and can be found in numerous additional countries (but not Moldova apparently).
The game first came to Canada in 1962 via Norm Liebeck, a decidedly unconventional Australian scuba diving instructor and dive shop owner, who introduced the sport to a Vancouver dive club. Ten years later, the Underwater Hockey Association of British Columbia (UHABC) was formed and received support from the BC government.
In South Africa there is still a commonly held belief that this sport was invented there in the early 1970s and although a form o
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