Kin Ball in Stuttgart: a bizarre game with a giant ball – Stuttgart

First come sports trousers that have thick padding on the hips, followed by high football socks and knee pads. Finally, Sarah Queneherve taped her shoelaces with black tape. Now it’s getting physical. It’s Thursday evening and kin-ball training is starting at Rydenburg Sports Hall. That what? Sarah Quenneherve is now used to asking questions. “People think it has something to do with the chin,” says the 33-year-old.

The kin-ball was invented in Canada in the 1980s and has since spread more or less around the world. “The Japanese are very good. It has become really popular in Asia,” says Sarah Queneherve. On the other hand, in Germany a giant ball game with a diameter of 1.22 meters and a weight of less than a kilogram is almost unknown. A niche sport. According to the online card of the German Kin-Ball Association, SV Sillenbuch is the only club in Baden-Württemberg to offer the game. Sarah Kneherwey is the head of the department and assistant coach there – and also the President of the German Kin-Ball Association for three years. have been.

SV Sillenbuch has included Kin Ball in its program

She and her husband Simon Ordoneau (33) brought the sport with them from their home country of France. “There are too many clubs out there. Ladies, gentlemen, the kids play there. It’s big,” says Sarah Quenneherv. The couple has been living in Mohringen since 2017. Both are part of the German national team – and at some point they aspired to produce Kin-Ball in their adopted Swabian country. With his idea, he went to the sports clubs to clean the door latches. SV Silenbuch immediately showed interest in including Kin-Ball in his portfolio. “I couldn’t have asked for better support. We two French guys come here and say we have a crazy game,” says the mechanical engineer and smiles broadly. The team game is three of four players each. Played with teams Basic goal: to prevent the ball from hitting the ground.

Sarah Queneherve remembers well how her husband signed her for a European Championship game on the women’s team a few years ago without consulting her. “I didn’t know,” she says. However, she quickly learned the quirky game with the giant ball – and she found it so much fun that she stuck to it. “Earlier I used to play volleyball and handball. If you know team sports, you get it quickly. “The cooperative, the teamwork is great, it gets really exciting when you slide under the ball with all that physical effort. She laughs out loud. “I could talk about Kin-Ball for hours.”

Kin ball is getting more and more popular

Sarah Queneherve has plans. She wants to make Kin-Ball more famous. “We definitely want to grow it,” she says. In February, SVS, a TV production company, was a guest at the Ridenburg Sports Hall to shoot a report for the children’s channel Kika. As president, Sarah Queneherve has also appeared in the ZDF television garden. Kin-ball is now played at sporting projects or in the Stuttgart full day care. In May 2023, the last match day of the Kien-Ball-Bundesliga season will begin in Sielenbuch.