Handball is a sport which is played in two teams each consisting of seven players. Strictly speaking each team has six field players and one goalkeeper. The goal of the game is to throw the ball in the opponent’s goal and thus to achieve a goal. The play lasts thirty minutes twice, youth teams do actually play shorter seasons. The winner team is that which has scored most goals after having played overall sixty minutes.
Apart from the general handball which is actually played in halls or gyms, there also exist two other variants of handball: On the one hand the former much more often played field handball, on the other hand, however, the beach handball which increasingly gains popularity.
Besides, it has to be taken into consideration that the term “handball” is no officially valid designation for playing handball as already described before. In the United States of America for instance handball means American Handball which is, however, a completely different sport.
Considering the rules of playing handball it can be said that the rink has the shape of a rectangle. Its size amounts to 40 m x 20 m. The whole rink is divided into two halves by the center line. The goals are placed in the middle of the narrow sides. The respective goal areas are in front of the goals. The space inside the whole rink / court, but outside the goal areas, is called “playing field”. The general rule says that all lines belong to the very space they do actually enclose. This means, in particular for the center line, that she belongs to both playing courts.
Both goals are three meters wide and two meters high. They have to be anchored safely in the floor or in the wall behind them. Moreover, the goal frame must have the shape of a rectangle. The goal posts as well as the crossbar that connects them have to consist of the same material, like wood or light metal, and also have to be painted with two very distinct colors that stand out clearly from the background. Both goals must have the same colors.
The space in front of each goal is called goal area. It is composed of two quarter circles, each having a radius of six meters, to the respective inner rear corner of the goal posts and a line which is formed parallel to the goal line. In this context it has to be mentioned that the goal area must not be accessed by any field player. Nevertheless, it is allowed to play the ball in the airspace over the goal. This means that a player may jump off in front of the goal line and throw the ball towards the goal from a very short distance. If a player enters the goal area without having the ball in his hand, he will have to hand the ball over to one of his opponents.
