England Dodgeball comes to Waterside

The world of elite level Dodgeball comes to Northampton this weekend for the first of a series of training camps being hosted at University’s Waterside Campus Sport Hub for the England Dodgeball Squad. The England Squad are currently the best in the world, being double world champions. Their training camps are designed to bring various age group squads together in preparation for international competition.

For those of you who are new to the sport Dodgeball is best described as a high intensity, high energy and rapid sport where two teams of six players, facing each other on a court, aim to eliminate their opponents by hitting them with a thrown ball!

The rules of the game allow five balls (three for the junior game) in play and you have to hit the opposing player anywhere on the body (below shoulders for juniors). If you are facing, then it's your job to dodge the ball. If the opposing player catches the ball, then you're eliminated and the team that made the catch gets another player back in the game. If all of your team have been eliminated, you lose or if time runs out and your team has the least amount of players on court. It’s a pretty hectic, high octane game!

Johnathan Rudland, the England and GB Team Manger said “These training camps at the University of Northampton are essential to the squad to bond, team build as well as develop skills and tactics. Although we returned as double world champions last year from the 2018 Dodgeball World Cup in New York, we are looking for all our squads to take their game to the next level and not rest on our past success.”

The University is the obvious and attractive place for the squad to train as Johnathan adds “We were really attracted to the University of Northampton for its excellent sport facilities where we can train, analyses performance and plan. The Waterside Campus is quite breath-taking. Being so close to the M1 and train station it’s also ideally located for our players to get to, as they come from all over the UK.”

Head of the department of Sport, Exercise and Life Sciences Dr Peer Jones comments “It’s great to host teams of the calibre of England Dodgeball but particularly as our students can get involved placement, internships and volunteering supporting the squad and seeing how an elite team operates up close. There are also a wealth of skills, labs and resources teams can access to help them improve and ultimately help them be their best.”

For more information about Dodgeball check out the British Dodgeball (National Governing Body) website at https://britishdodgeball.org/

For details of Sport, Exercise and Life Science degrees at the University of Northampton click here or check out our @UoNSELS Twitter and UoNSELS Instagram accounts.

The University of Northampton has moved to its new £330 million Waterside Campus this summer and was awarded Gold in the Government’s TEF (Teaching Excellence Framework), the highest possible mark for the quality of its teaching.