Fringe Sports: Bandy

[Zoid]

Ashers british ice hockey thread got me thinking of sports that are not so big... And being a swede bandy comes to mind. For those who don't know it it looks like field hockey on ice... It's big in Sweden, Finland and Russia. Other countries include among others Norway, Holland, Estonia and Mongolia(!). There's been World Championships since 1957, at first with only four nations (Sweden, USSR, Finland, Norway). Then in 1985(!!) USA was the fifth country to attend. In the recent WC in Russia 12 nations attended. Needless to say the gap between the tree big ones and the others are quite massive (Think Man United vs LA Galaxy...) and you get the picture. USSR/Russia is the dominant with 18 WC titles, followed by Swedens 8 and Finlands 1 (which they won in 2004 ending the USSR/Russia - Sweden monopoly ) In fact the USSR won all games until 1981 when Sweden won for the first time...

Current members of the International Bandy Federation:

* Australia - Australian Bandy Federation
* Canada - Canada Bandy
* Belarus -
* Estonia -
* Finland - Suomen Jääpalloliitto
* Hungary - Magyar Bandy Szövetség
* India -
* Ireland -
* Italy -
* Kazakstan -
* Kyrgyzstan -
* Latvia - Latvijas Bendija Federācija
* Mongolia -
* Netherlands - Dutch Bandy Federation
* Poland -
* Norway - Norges Bandyforbund
* Russia - All Russian bandy federation
* Serbia -
* Sweden - Svenska bandyförbundet
* Switzerland -
* United States - American Bandy Association

[rah]

I've never seen it on ESPN 2 so it can't even be a psuedo sport.

[Asher]

Ringette

4 gurls LOL

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ringette

[Zoid]

Originally posted by rah
I've never seen it on ESPN 2 so it can't even be a psuedo sport.

Btw, can you remove the "bandy" from the thread title. That way we can keep all the fringe sports in one thread

[Lord Avalon]

Originally posted by rah
I've never seen it on ESPN 2 so it can't even be a psuedo sport.

Maybe it's on the Ocho.

Edit: I was hoping they didn't use skates in bandy, but no such luck.