Ranchi, June 15: The 2nd National Floorball Festival kicked off at the local community hall with an exhibition match between host Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh today.

Altogether eight teams are participating in the festival, which will conclude on June 17. The teams are Uttarakhand, Haryana, Punjab, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Chandigarh apart from the above mentioned two teams.

These teams will play each other on round robin basis over the next two days. Tomorrow 12 matches will be played altogether.

Two teams, each comprising six players including a goalkeeper, play three sets of 20 minutes each. The match is of 60 minutes duration with two breaks. Interesting part of this game is that the goalkeeper has to be on his knees in front of a small goal post. With bare hands and has to kneel down to defend.

The exhibition match between Jharkhand and UP revealed the game’s speed and its subtleties. Players slipped and dashed against the side boards while trying to get control of the soft white ball as the cement floor is the not the ideal surface for this game.

“This game is played on an artificial surface, but as this game is new to the city and the state, we are trying to do our best with the facilities available here,” said one of the referees.

Known as the poor cousin of ice hockey, floorball is a fast paced game. It was first played in Finland in 1986. Basically a European game, it made its appearance in India in 2002, said Pankaj Raj, a national referee from Uttarakhand.