Handball, the perfect sport

So far television has spared us the sport doubling as a military or guerrilla warrior training programmes. That's the rifle and pistol shooting. Or, if it didn't I, thankfully, missed it. It's boring. Until they let the competitors stalk each other with rifles through shrubbery or mock up villages, a la paintball, I'm happy to keep missing it.

But then, I fell across something that's as close to the perfect sport as it goes. It's Handball. Played indoors it's a mix of basketball and soccer.

Players dribble the ball down the court. Then they blast it at a soccer-type goal, one big enough for the attacking team to score, unlike say, ice hockey, with a large, heavily padded goalie soaking up all the space.

It's faster than basketball, where a point guard gets the ball up the court, and hangs around until everyone else arrives, followed by twenty four seconds of not much while everyone waits for the star to shoot.

Handball has seven players per team, six in open court, plus a goalkeeper. It's perfect for television because it's so contained, and any monkey business is easy to spot. The emphasis is on defence as much as attack, so ignoring defence and hoping to blitz to a win is a micturate into the wind.

Based on the women's match between France and Angola netballers could convert easily. They have the fitness, the required quickness, and the hand-eye speed.

The plague of netball, the endless whistling, isn't there. It'd also have New Zealand's women athletes enjoying life in the rugby boy's lane, and especially those playing Sevens. That's world-wide travel, stacking up better than trekking across the Tasman, with four yearly world championships, and the last of those was in Henderson.

The only cloud is the one soccer faces. They'd be playing the best of the world, rather than sheltering in a game hardly anyone else plays.

Still, after the initial floggings we might have something that'd be fun to play, be great on television, and give the women some wickedly good trips.