Don’t let the unfamiliarity of the sport’s name put you off — korf simply means ‘basket’ in Dutch. It’s a ball-in-basket sport which has a distinctive set-up and design, but which can be likened to netball and basketball in certain aspects.
Picture this:
A whistle screeches in the gym hall, marking a successful shot into the ‘korf’. Bystanders watch as the players rotate from the attacking half to the defending half of the court, and vice versa. The players crouch and position themselves readily, clock ticking, heartbeats pounding, planning where the ball will go next, how they can get the next successful shot.
This is a unique phenomenon in korfball — every two goals, players switch roles, creating a regular and exciting rotation throughout the 50-minute matches. Interestingly, games are only 44 minutes in the Scottish league. The aim of the game is to get the ball into the korf — like a netball basket, it has no backboard, but it is a distinctive hoop instead, and measures 3.5 meters or 11.5 feet long.
One of the main characteristics of korfball is the ‘defended’ rule — anyone who attempts to shoot whilst their opposition is defending close enough in front of them to touch them, causes the whistle blow and the ball is deferred to the other team as a result of shooting a ‘defended shot.’ This not only removes a lot of height advantage but also shapes the character of the game — it’s a deeply strategic sport. It forces attackers to manoeuvre to set up a play in a way that tricks or misleads their defender, in order to freely make a shot. Unlike basketball, there is no dribbling of the ball, putting teamwork right at the heart of good gameplay. The range of 2-3 steps on the lead up to a shot furthermore allows for dynamic shooting.
However, all these defending rules must conform to the ‘gendered-marking’ rule — no one who is playing as a ‘man’ can mark-up a ‘woman’ and vice-versa.
Another characteristic of korfball is that it is intentionally mixed-gendered — there are four ‘girls’ and 4 ‘boys’ to a team. This does not just factor in equality, but also rethinks strategy — as players can only mark the same gender, this encourages cooperation to set up plays and get free from opponents. The International Korfball Federation has last year updated the rules to clarify the teams — the terms are now clarified as “Male at Birth + Open Gender” and “Female at Birth.”
As it’s a rather niche sport, you will find all sorts of people playing korfball. It is said that the sport attracts a certain type of person, and this resonates within the community: korfball clubs are very rarely toxic spaces and even on the court, players chat amicably, and it builds bridges between different demographics.
Korfball is a dynamic, sociable, and controlled-contact ball sport which can best be likened with netball and basketball — at once novel yet familiar. The unique strategy plays and rules to korfball may take some adjusting, but for many this is an extremely welcoming and engaging sport.
If you’re interested in trying the sport out — at either competitive or non-competitive level — find the UOE club on instagram at @edunikorfball.
“Partit de korfbal” by Joan GarciaBadalonais licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
