Lions and the sport of game ball

The sport of game ball and the Hungarian Lions movement first met in March, 2010 in Győrújbarát where the First Lions Club of Győr organized a charity game ball gala.

The apropos of the tournament were given by the fact that the male national team of game ball, the sport which can be considered as the Paralympics equivalent of handball, first achieved to gain the right to participate in the World Cup. The arrangements of the gala had various purposes.

The club that organised the gala invited the Slovak national game ball team to provide a suitable training partner for the Hungarian national team preparing for the world competition. Another goal was to draw public attention to the everyday difficulties of the vision impaired, as well as to familiarize the vision impaired with the sport itself.

Following discussions with Dr Gábor Ramocsa, the then head coach of the national team, plans of a national road show were outlined where the Hungarian national team could play demonstration games in different towns of the country in order to popularize the sport among the vision impaired.

That was when the idea occurred that it would be practical to get Hungarian Lions club involved in the initiatives as associate organisers. The First Lions Club of Győr undertook the task of winning over Lions club for the series of events who would provide the venues for the demonstration games in their own places of residence and carry out the tasks related to the organization of the games.

Straight that December local Lions organized a huge game ball fiesta in Székesfehérvár in the KÖFÉM Sports Hall. Apart from primary and secondary school students, ice hockey players of the town and the local female handball team in the First National League also took part, as well as the local police station which also entered a team for the games. In 2011-2012 it was mainly the town of Győr which hosted game ball events. The team made up of local vision impaired people had weekly trainings and popularized the sport in schools in the course of sensitization activities and demonstration games.

In the spring of 2013, the Lions Club Association of Hungary and the Hungarian Handball Association signed a contract of cooperation whereby they agreed to work together as partners in the program that they had worked out together with the aim to promote the popularity of the team sport in the country. The agreement was signed by Spissák István, the District Governor.

Thanks to the cooperation the First Lady Lions Club of Miskolc joined the program on June 1st that year, by hosting a successful game ball cup. Many interested viewers took part in the cup which took place in the Lévay József High School. Apart from the students, vision impaired also tried themselves in the sport. It didn’t take long until they started regular trainings with the special ball left at the venue, and they started a team.

In the autumn of 2013, tactile stripes were glued to the floor of the sports hall of the Olad Cultural Centre in Szombathely. A team of the local vision impaired competed against the very popular Ocho Macho band of Szombathely, as well as the game ball team of Győr.

In May 2014, the three clubs in Győr organized a game ball gala in Győrújbarát again. The Arrabona Lions Club, the Patrónus Lions Club and the First Lions Club of Győr invited schools and colleagues of companies to fight in a round-robin tournament for the places of the 3rd Győr Gameball Cup.

On November 21, on the Lions day in Gödöllő, the sport hall of the Széchenyi István University was the venue of the sensitization demonstration game for secondary school students, with about 80 students taking part. The interested viewers could familiarize themselves with game ball after the demonstration game of the game ball team of Eger.

The year 2015 awaits us with really joyful events which are still being formed but soon we can make all the news about them public.

Gábor Molnár
First Lions Club of Győr
game ball coordinator