New Sport Emerging In Central Missouri

High School students in Missouri may have something to do during their long summer break. A new sport, Hybrisball, is beginning its first year. The new sport will be running small tests this season to to determine whether it will be successful. If reactions are good, founders plan to spread the sport across the state, with the eventual goal being to form one statewide league.

Hybrisball is a combination of several sports, tweaked with its own set of rules to make it unique. Each team has seven players on the field, with substitutes free to come in and out, similar to hockey. These seven players try to move a seven inch diameter ball into a goal. They can use any means of moving the ball except kicking.

The field itself is 50 yards long, 30 yards wide. Goals are 30 yards apart, with 10 yards behind each goal. Goals are 7 feet wide, 4 feet tall.

A good high school sport is not complete without high-contact, and this sport has plenty of it. Players may make contact with any player on the field, whether they have the ball or not. This contact has very few limitations, and allows any player to be taken to the ground at any time.

At this point in discussion, many felt the new sport would fail because players would spend all their time tackling opponents and not concentrating on scoring goals. This is, however, far from the case. In an organized team sport requiring the cooperation of the whole team, it would hurt the team to attack players with reckless abandon. Doing so takes the player momentarily out of the game, opening a whole for the other team to exploit. To further ensure a more "organized" violence, the sport allows all players to move freely anywhere throughout the field.

Taking a page from soccer, Hybrisball games are divided into two 45 minute halves, with continuous clock. Game time stops every nine minutes for a two and a half minute break. There are no team timeouts.

Hybrisball is still in the early stages of development, but has a lot of potential to grow. It has already seen interest by high school students and should have no problems getting players for this year's test runs.

The sport is just being finished. Game founders are hoping to have teams finalized by mid-May, with the season officially starting at the beginning of June and extending to August.

If you would like to learn more about Hyrbrisball, please feel free to view the sports official website at: www.hybrisball.webs.com .