Handball has not only been an integral part of the Olympic Games for a long time, but also of the Paralympic Games for several years. In this article, I am going to tell you about the story of wheelchair handball.

First of all, what is wheelchair handball?
As the name already tells us, it is handball played in a wheelchair. People with different kinds of physical disabilities like spina bifida, birth defects, cerebral palsy, paralysis due to accident or amputations of the legs or other parts can compete against each other. Of course, the rules have to be adapted.

Rule comparison between handball and wheelchair handball.
The basics are the same. There are two teams, that try to score a goal or prevent the other team to score a goal. The Hand is the body part, that you are allowed to use.
Each team has a total of 12 players maximum, while 5 players and a goalkeeper are on the court. There have to be three women on each team, at least one woman has to be at the court at all time.
In the professional wheelchair handball, a size two ball is used. Not like in men’s handball a size three ball. The court has the same size as a normal handball court (20 meters wide and 40 meters long). A game consists of two halves of 20 minutes each. In between is a 10 minutes break. Every team has one one-minute-timeout per half. If a game goes into overtime, they can use a third overtime during the extra playing time. In wheelchair handball, the height of the goal is reduced to 1.6 meters. There is a bunch of equipment, that is not allowed to be used: Handball resin, protective equipment that includes metal, prostheses, braces made of plastic, metal, etc.
There are a couple of very complicated Specifications for the wheelchair. I think the rule, that sums all of it up is: The wheelchairs shall be constructed in a safe and fair way without any risk for the player himself, his team colleagues or the opponent team. A wheelchair can be banned from the game, if there is any concern about its safety or fairness.
Also for dribble with the ball, the rules had to be adapted. Instead of doing three steps, you are allowed to push the wheelchair three times maximum with the ball on (not between) your legs. You can block players with your arms and wheelchair, as long as the opponent is not in a great speed.
The referee has the same options of punishment as in normal handball. There are the yellow, red and blue cards, as well as the free throws, seven-meter penalties and two-minute penalties.
Of course there are more rules, but these are the most important ones.

Time labs of the History of wheelchair handball.
It all started 1990 in Japan. I Kyoto was the first wheelchair handball tournament. Three years later was a demonstration match at Coaches Symposium in Germany. At the same time, they played wheelchair handball (still without rules) at the State University of Campinas in Brazil. In 2001, the first regular annual wheelchair handball competition takes place in Japan. However, the Japanese Wheelchair Handball Federation (JWHF) was formed two years later. Another demonstration match was played at the International Handball Federation (IHF) Symposium for Coaches and Referees in Bangkok. It was a big deal, since the European Handball Federation (EHF) started to work together with rehabilitation patients and the Austrian wheelchair basketball team to test new game variations. In 2008, the first wheelchair handball seminar and tournament was held in Austria. One year later was the first national team match between Chile and Brazil. Since 2015, there were four European nation wheelchair tournaments. The first European championship was supposed to be in 2020, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it had to be canceled. In 2022, the first, they were able to make up the canceled tournament.

That is all for this article. I hope you liked it. Since wheelchair handball is just starting to become an international sport, it will probably get more famous every year. I personally never watched a game, but it is on my bucket list for sure.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheelchair_handball (03/2023)
http://cms.eurohandball.com/PortalData/1/Resources/1_ehf_main/3_download_pdf/How_to_play_WCHB.pdf (28 July 16 / rab)
https://www.ihf.info/media-center/news/evolution-discipline-sport-wheelchair-handball-and-ihf (16 Jul. 2021)