Beach handball

Beach handball, 🤾a sport that is gaining more and more followers🏆🥇

The year advances and in no time we will reach summer. With the good weather we feel like going out more and with the rise in temperatures the first sports competitions that are practiced outdoors also arrive, such as beach handball.

History of beach handball

Despite the fact that handball is a sport with a long history, beach handball is very young and did not begin to be practised regularly until the 1990s.

Due to the characteristics of the playing field, it is a sport that is practised more logically in countries with the coast and with higher spring-summer temperatures. You don't need many materials to play beach handball, which makes it easier for this sport to gain more and more followers.

According to some authors, this sport began to be practised in Italy, where indoor handball players began to practice it while they were on the beach with their teammates.

From Italy, it spread to other Mediterranean countries, and from there, it spread throughout the planet.

The rules of this sport arose naturally among those who practised it until it began to be regulated by federations.

Currently, tournaments and competitions are fully regulated, and there are two an International Handball Federation (IHF) and a European Federation (EHF), and a Spanish one, the Royal Spanish Handball Federation.

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Beach handball rules

It is played on a 27 x 12-meter field, with a playing area and two goal areas.

The surface of the ground must be beach sand, which is marked with field lines for beach handball. The arena must have a minimum depth of 40 cm, and the field must have a north-south orientation.

The team is made up of a maximum of 10 players, of which at least 6 must be present at the start of the match.

In each beach handball match, 4 people play 3 outfield players and one goalkeeper per team, leaving the rest of the players as reserves. If at any time during the match, the number of players entitled to play falls below 4 (due to sanctions or injuries), the match is suspended, and the opposing team wins.

The goalkeeper can leave his area and play the role of a normal player, and any player can also play the role of a goalkeeper.

It is a very fast game, and each beach handball tournament lasts two periods of 10 minutes each, between which there is a 5-minute break.

At the beginning of the game, the referee draws lots for the choice of field. The winning team chooses the field and will keep it during the first half, exchanging it with their competitors in the second half.

Goals in beach handball have a different value; in some cases, they have special bonuses.

- If the goalkeeper scores a goal from outside his zone, one more point is added.

- If the goalkeeper scores a goal from his zone, two points are added to the scoreboard.

- If the goal is made with a throw of more than 6 meters, it is worth one more point.

If, at the end of one of the periods, there is a tie, it is resolved with a "golden goal"; the referee takes the ball from the centre of the field and the team that first scores a goal wins the game.

If at the end of the tournament, each team has won a period, the tiebreaker is made by "player against goalkeeper". Five players from each team shoot alternately against the opposing team, and the team that accumulates the most goals wins the match. If there is a tie, the fields are exchanged, and the throws are repeated and so on, until one of the teams wins the match.

How to play beach handball

As I'm sure, you've thought about reading the beach handball rules, with very open rules regarding player roles.

The rules of the beach handball game also make it especially fast and explosive, as you will see below:

The ball can be thrown, caught, stopped, pushed or hit using the hands (open or closed), arms, head, trunk, thighs or knees.

When a player receives a ball, they cannot keep it in possession for more than 3 seconds.

In addition, he can only take a maximum of 3 steps with the ball.

A player cannot touch the ball more than once if, between the two receptions, it has not touched the ground, another player or the goal.

As you can see, possessions in beach handball are very short, which forces a very fast game.

Also, a team cannot keep the ball in possession without making recognizable attempts to attack or shoot on goal. If you do this, it is considered “passive play”. When the referee detects this conduct, he penalizes the team that is executing it with a "free kick", and the opposing team takes possession of the ball from the point where passive play was detected.

To remove the ball from the opposing team, arms and hands may be used to block the ball and seize it or remove it with an open hand from either side. It is not allowed to tear it from the opponent's hands or hit it when another player is in possession.

The path of a player from the opposing team can be obstructed, even when they are not in possession of the ball. He can even come into body contact with an opponent, preventing him from moving forward, facing the opponent with his arms bent. However, you cannot "hold" the opponent by grabbing him by the body or uniform; the opponent's block must be clean. 

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Materials to play beach handball

To play beach handball, you need the following materials :

- Ball. The beach handball ball must be made of rubber or similar material that prevents the ball from slipping out of the hands. When played outside and in spring and summer, the ambient temperature is higher, so you sweat more, hence the importance of the ball being made of rubber.

- Goal. The beach handball goal has the same characteristics and dimensions as a traditional handball goal, having to be resistant to high temperatures.

- Field delimiters. The dimensions of the field are different from those of traditional handballs. The field is a rectangle 27 meters long by 12 meters wide. Using beach handball field lines with the correct measurements is very important to ensure compliance with the regulations.

Beach handball benefits

Beach handball is a sport that is played as a team and, therefore, encourages camaraderie.

It is a clean contact sport with very open rules, very fast and explosive, which is played outdoors and on terrain as fun as the beach.

It is very complete from the psychomotor point of view, and in practice, it works a large number of muscle groups, from arms to legs, through the back, abdominals and lower back.

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