The official rules for the game of bandy were born, oddly enough, in a country that has not developed this sport for a long time - in the UK. In 1891, the National Bandy Association was created there, which published the first set of hockey laws. Six years later, their Russian counterpart appeared in St. Petersburg, and in 1955 - an improved version, used in the 2011 edition of the year, and at the present time.
Training of football players
Great Britain, as you know, is the ancestor of not only hockey, which later became Canadian, but also football. It was for the winter training of the players preparing for the season at the end of the nineteenth century that the sport was invented, to some extent combining football with hockey. Besides English-speaking bandy, it is also called Russian hockey or bandy. As in regular hockey, bandy is played on ice using hockey sticks of a different design. The uniform of the players is similar, including the obligatory skates, helmets and protective equipment.
With football, Russian hockey connects the same number of players on the field - 11, including one goalkeeper, the similarity of their roles, the duration of the match - two halves of 45 minutes with a break, as well as the ball, albeit much smaller in size and weight. Gradually, however, British footballers began to abandon bandy, and soon this sport in England ceased to exist. Its clubs and national teams have not taken part in any official competitions for a long time and do not even strive for it. Unlike such non-winter countries as Mongolia and Somalia.
In Russia, where bandy, which eventually became almost popular, appeared thanks to the efforts of the Petersburg enthusiast Peter Moskvin. Back in 1888, Moskvin created the "Circle of Sports Amateurs" and the "Sport" club. Their participants began not only to train, but also to promote Russian hockey. Nine years later, he wrote his own version of the rules of the game, and on March 20, 1898, he played the first match at the city's Northern skating rink. It is curious that in the 30-40s of the last century, many famous Soviet athletes, for example, Vsevolod Bobrov, successfully combined three sports at once, each of which had its own rules - football, bandy and hockey that appeared in the country later than other with a washer.
According to the precepts of Peter
According to historians, in ancient times, on the territory of modern Scandinavia, Great Britain, Russia and the Netherlands, they were also fond of a game that resembled just bendy. There is even a version that one of the fans of bandy, as a gambling game in the frosty winter air, very conducive to health improvement, was the Russian Tsar Peter. From the Netherlands to St. Petersburg, he allegedly brought not only a project to create a Russian fleet and a whole group of shipbuilders, but also a hockey stick, skates and the rules of the game of those years.
As you know, Russia of Peter the Great's times and Sweden had rather complicated relations, which in the twentieth century turned into acute rivalry. Fortunately, only in a sports game. So, the Scandinavians' response to the initiative of the Russian Moskvin was the bandy rules published in 1907 in Stockholm and applied for almost 50 years in three of the four countries where this sport was most developed - in Sweden proper, as well as in Norway and Finland. The fourth was the USSR, which stubbornly continued to play by the rules of Peter Moskvin and until a certain moment ignored its northern neighbors.
A compromise had to be found on the eve of the first world championship planned by the IBF (International Bandy Federation) created in 1955. Negotiations between representatives of the four leading European powers in this sport were not too long, and the 1957 World Championship in Finland, which ended with the victory of the USSR national team, took place according to unified and satisfactory rules. In the future, however, they were supplemented several times, in particular, in 2003 and 2011, but the main points were still preserved.
Striped shape
The set of rules of the game, which takes place on an open ice field, whose dimensions are identical to a football one (length from 90 to 110, width from 50 to 70 meters), is quite solid. Therefore, it is worth mentioning only a few that are most indicative for ball hockey. The time of one match is two halves of 45 minutes + a 20-minute break between them. But in the event of a frost of more than 35 degrees, it is allowed to change the format of the match by the chief referee: three halves of 30 minutes or even four are held, two of which are played for 25 and two more for 20. The referees in the field, unlike football and hockey, there are only two in bandy, plus one more at the table, registering goals, substitutions and penalties. The referees are distinguished from hockey players by a striped uniform and a black helmet.
Removals of players, as in Canadian hockey, occur either for a certain number of minutes - 5 (white card) and 10 (blue), or until the end of the game (red). Other penalties and standard situations are almost identical to football - free or free kick-penalty, only breaking through from the 12-meter mark, corner. But hitting the ball with your head, unlike football, is prohibited. Just like playing lying down, sitting or kneeling. You cannot play along with or stop the ball with your hands in Russian hockey, following the example of ice hockey.
