PRESS RELEASE | Author: Lubomír Skála | 13th August, 2012

The “appetizer” of the upcoming jubilee 20th Czech open in the form of the wheelchair Prague Wheel Open - organised for the second time, has already their winners. Among the medallists you will find two Czech and one Dutch team – but contrary to the premiere tournament the most precious trophy goes to the country of tulips this time – the team called Doing.

In the quarter-finals there were 4 Czech and 4 foreign teams and the tournament continued with the same ratio to the very finals. The first semi-final was played between the Dutch Doing and a home team SKV Prague ComAp Team. Despite the impressive finishing spurt of the Prague team the Dutch champions didn’t give up on victory and with a score 3:2 paid back the last year’s defeat to the ComAp Team. The second struggle for the presence at the finals was again decided by one single goal and to the satisfaction of the Czech supporters the second position was guaranteed to the newly reborn team of FBC United České Budějovice over the Dutch De Watergeuzen full of national team players. They qualified for the finals with a victory 2:1.

At a small coffee and bagel shop off Main Street in Vancouver, the BC Floorball Federation held it’s first planning meeting with local Wheelchair Hockey athletes Adam Frost and Hilary Brown.

The outcome was the launch of a local Wheelchair Floorball team, the organizing  of Canada’s first official Wheelchair Floorball demonstration game at the Richmond Olympic Oval, and a full review of the International Wheelchair Floorball tournament circuit and Power Hockey Floorball events.

Czech Wheelchair Floorball Federation has again sent the national team to an exhibition match to accompany an IFF event. The visit rate record from the very first exhibition held at O2 Arena during final of the Men's World Championship 2008 will probably not be topped any time soon. Then, a Czech-Swedish mini-match was played in front of over 14 000 spectators.

Wheelchair Floorball is played almost with the same rules as Floorball. Wheelchair Floorball was played for the first time in the ParaGames 2011 played in Breda, the Netherlands, October 6th to 9th 2011.The International Paralympic Committee (IPC) officially certified ParaGamesBreda (PGB). The Paragames is a multisport event for disabled players and 3000 sportsmen and women from close to 25 different sports and 40 countries participated in the event.

Four Floorball teams representing Czech Republic, Germany, Netherlands and Sweden played in the ParaGames 2011. The winner of the tournament was Sweden. ParaFloorball section IFF