Bandy World Championship

Bandy World Championship

Most recent season or competition: 2015 Bandy World Championship
Sport	Bandy
Inaugural season	1957
No. of teams	16 (last tournament)
Countries	world
Most recent champion(s)	Russia (9th title)
Most titles	Soviet Union (14 titles)
Official website	worldbandy.com

Kyrgyzstan and Japan were the newcomers for the XXXIInd championship in 2012. Here, the Kyrgyzstan team defend their goal when Japan is about to make a corner stroke. Kyrgyzstan has yet to make another world championship appearance.

Arena Vänersborg in Sweden, the main venue of the XXXIIIrd championship, held in 2013

The Bandy World Championships are a competition between bandy-playing nations. The tournament is administrated by the Federation of International Bandy. It is distinct from the Bandy World Cup, a club competition.

History

Although bandy has been played since the 19th century, the first men's world championships were only played in 1957, and the first women's ones were only in 2004. Bandy tournament was held as a demonstration sport at the 1952 Winter Olympics in Oslo, but this had no world championship status. A four nation tournament in 1954 was played in Moscow, this was the first time the Soviet Union met teams from other countries and the first time the new, jointly agreed rules were used, but this wasn't called a world championship. The international federation was founded in 1955 by the four countries which had played in Moscow.

The first ever Bandy World Championship was organised in 1957 in association with the 50th anniversary of the Ball Association of Finland, which at the time was the governing body of bandy in Finland. It was played at the Helsinki Olympic Stadium.

From 1961-2003, the men's championships were played every two years, but has since then been played annually.

Participating nations

For a long time, only four countries competed in the world championships: the Soviet Union, Sweden, Finland and Norway, with the Soviet Union as the dominating country. Since then, more countries have joined the tournaments, starting with the United States in 1985. The interest for the sport has spread to other parts of Europe, North America and Asia, and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 also opened the way for separate national teams from the former states of that union. Somalia became the first team from Africa to compete, in the 2014 tournament in Irkutsk. The record number of participants are 17, set in 2014. According to the official homepage of the 2016 WCS, 18 are expected, including the debutant Czech Republic.[3] There are also reports about Canada returning, making it 19.[4]

Denmark, Switzerland, Armenia and Poland are countries that have expressed interest in participating in future tournaments, but has so far (2015) not made any appearance.

With more nations competing, Group B was created in 1991. From 2012 there was a Group C for the first time as 14 countries participated and in 2014 there were two groups with two sub-groups each for the first time, increasing the number of teams in Group A from six to eight. The number of groups is not fixed, it is changed from year to year. Japan and Kyrgyzstan made their first World Championships in 2012, Ukraine joined in 2013, Germany and Somalia made their debuts in 2014 and China in 2015. Russia, Finland, Sweden, Kazakhstan, Norway, USA and Belarus usually play in group A. Until 2011, the best team in group B used to go into a playoff match with the team which came bottom of the A-group, replacing them if they won. In 2004 the B-pool was played in a location separate from group A for the first time, at the City Park Ice Rink in Budapest. In 2013 this happened again as Vetlanda hosted the B-pool, whereas Vänersborg was the main venue of the A-pool with three matches played at other locations, Trollhättan, Gothenburg and Oslo. In 2015 the tournament is separated in time while in the same city. The matches in the lower groups are usually shorter in time.

Participating teams

G = gold, S = silver, B = bronze, X = took part, but won no medal

Team	57	61	63	65	67	69	71	73	75	77	79	81	83	85	87	89	91	93	95	97	99	01	03	04	05	06	07	08	09	10	11	12	13	14	15
Finland	S	B	S	X	S	B	B	B	B	B	B	B	B	B	S	S	B	X	B	B	S	B	X	G	X	B	B	B	B	B	S	X	X	X	X
Soviet Union	G	G	G	G	G	G	G	G	G	G	G	S	S	G	B	G	G
Sweden	B	S	B	B	B	S	S	S	S	S	S	G	G	S	G	B	S	G	G	G	B	S	G	S	G	S	S	S	G	G	B	G	S	S	S
Norway		X	X	S	X		X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	B	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X
United States														X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X
Canada																	X	X	X	X				X	X	X		X	X	X	X	X	X	X
Hungary																	X	X	X	X				X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X
Netherlands																	X	X		X			X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X
Russia																		S	S	S	G	G	S	B	S	G	G	G	S	S	G	S	G	G	G
Kazakhstan																			X	X	X	X	B	X	B	X	X	X	X	X	X	B	B	B	B
Belarus																						X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X		X	X	X	X	X
Estonia																							X	X	X	X	X	X	X			X	X	X	X
Mongolia																										X	X	X	X	X				X	X
Latvia																											X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X
Japan																																X	X	X	X
Kyrgyzstan																																X
Ukraine																																	X	X
Germany																																		X	X
Somalia																																		X	X
China																																			X

Competition format

Originally, the competition was played as an all-meet-all round-robin tournament. Starting in 1983, semifinals and a final was added to follow the round-robin stage.

When the number of participating nations increased, the championship was split up in two groups from 2003 onwards, A and B, with the better teams in Group A. The winner of Group B will typically play a game against the least successfull team of Group A to determine qualification for Group A for next year.

TV broadcasting

The interest is biggest in Sweden, Finland and Russia. For a few times now it has been shown on Eurosport 2. FIB has given the rights for the 2012 tournament to SPORTLIVE LLC.

Results

No.	Year	Host	Final Venue		Gold medal	Result	Silver medal		Bronze medal	Result	Fourth place	Teams
I	1957 Details	Finland	Helsinki Olympic Stadium		Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Finland		Sweden	Decided by round-robin result	Only three teams participated	3
II	1961 Details	Norway			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Sweden		Finland	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
III	1963 Details	Sweden	Stockholm Olympic Stadium		Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Finland		Sweden	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
IV	1965 Details	Soviet Union			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Norway		Sweden	Decided by round-robin result	Finland	4
V	1967 Details	Finland			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Finland		Sweden	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
VI	1969 Details	Sweden			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Sweden		Finland	Decided by round-robin result	Only three teams participated	3
VII	1971 Details	Sweden			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Sweden		Finland	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
VIII	1973 Details	Soviet Union			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Sweden		Finland	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
IX	1975 Details	Finland			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Sweden		Finland	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
X	1977 Details	Norway			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Sweden		Finland	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
XI	1979 Details	Sweden			Soviet Union	Decided by round-robin result	Sweden		Finland	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
XII	1981 Details	Soviet Union	(Khabarovsk)		Sweden	Decided by round-robin result	Soviet Union		Finland	Decided by round-robin result	Norway	4
XIII	1983 Details	Finland	(Helsinki)		Sweden	9–3	Soviet Union		Finland	4–1	Norway	4
XIV	1985 Details	Norway	(Oslo)		Soviet Union	5–4 (a.e.t.)	Sweden		Finland	6–2	Norway	5
XV	1987 Details	Sweden	Söderstadion (Stockholm)		Sweden	7–2	Finland		Soviet Union	11–3	Norway	5
XVI	1989 Details	Soviet Union	Moscow Olympic Stadium		Soviet Union	12–2	Finland		Sweden	6–0	Norway	5
XVII	1991 Details	Finland	Oulunkylä Ice Rink (Helsinki)		Soviet Union	4–3	Sweden		Finland	8–0	Norway	8
XVIII	1993 Details	Norway	Hamar Olympic Hall		Sweden	8–0	Russia		Norway	5–3	Finland	8
XIX	1995 Details	United States	John Rose Minnesota Oval (Roseville)		Sweden	6–4	Russia		Finland	3–2	Kazakhstan	8
XX	1997 Details	Sweden	Rocklunda IP (Västerås)		Sweden	10–5	Russia		Finland	9–3	Kazakhstan	9
XXI	1999 Details	Russia	Trud Stadium (Arkhangelsk)		Russia	5–0	Finland		Sweden	9–1	Norway	6
XXII	2001 Details	Finland Sweden	(Oulu FIN)		Russia	6–1	Sweden		Finland	3–2	Kazakhstan	7
XXIII	2003 Details	Russia	Trud Stadium (Arkhangelsk)		Sweden	5–4	Russia		Kazakhstan	4–1	Finland	9
XXIV	2004 Details	Sweden Hungary	Rocklunda IP (Västerås SWE)		Finland	5–4 (a.e.t.)	Sweden		Russia	5–2	Kazakhstan	11
XXV	2005 Details	Russia	Trudovye Rezervy Stadium (Kazan)		Sweden	5–2	Russia		Kazakhstan	5–3	Finland	11
XXVI	2006 Details	Sweden	Zinkensdamms IP (Stockholm)		Russia	3–2	Sweden		Finland	7–4	Kazakhstan	12
XXVII	2007 Details	Russia	Khimik Stadium (Kemerovo)		Russia	3–1	Sweden		Finland	5–4 (a.e.t.)	Kazakhstan	12
XXVIII	2008 Details	Russia	Olympic Stadium (Moscow)		Russia	6–1	Sweden		Finland	8–3	Kazakhstan	13
XXIX	2009 Details	Sweden	ABB Arena Syd (Västerås)		Sweden	6–1	Russia		Finland	7–3	Kazakhstan	13
XXX	2010 Details	Russia	Ice Palace Krylatskoye (Moscow)		Sweden	6–5 (a.e.t.)	Russia		Finland	4–3 (a.e.t.)	Kazakhstan	11
XXXI	2011 Details	Russia	Trudovye Rezervy Stadium (Kazan)		Russia	6–1	Finland		Sweden	14–3	Kazakhstan	11
XXXII	2012 Details	Kazakhstan	Medeu (Almaty)		Sweden	5–4	Russia		Kazakhstan	10–5	Finland	14
XXXIII	2013 Details	Sweden Norway	Arena Vänersborg (Vänersborg SWE)		Russia	4–3	Sweden		Kazakhstan	6–3	Finland	14
XXXIV	2014 Details	Russia	Trud Stadium (Irkutsk)		Russia	3–2	Sweden		Kazakhstan	5–3	Finland	17
XXXV	2015 Details	Russia	Arena Yerofey (Khabarovsk)		Russia	5–3	Sweden		Kazakhstan	8–6	Finland	16
XXXVI	2016 Details	Russia	Trud Stadium (Ulyanovsk)
XXXVII	2017 Details	Sweden	Göransson Arena (Sandviken)

Medeu was the main arena for the 2012 tournament

Medal table

Countries in italics no longer compete at the World Championships.

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Soviet Union	14	2	1	17
2	Sweden	11	18	6	35
3	Russia	9	8	1	18
4	Finland	1	6	20	27
5	Norway	0	1	1	2
6	Kazakhstan	0	0	6	6

External links

• Results from the championships 1957-1999 by Per G. Olsson at the Wayback Machine (archived October 28, 2009)