Portable goals bring goalball to students at UWA Orientation Week event

Students joining the University of Western Australia (UWA) got a taste of the unique and challenging sport of goalball during a recent Orientation Day event.

The ‘O Week’ event, organised by Goalball Western Australia in collaboration with the university’s inclusion team, made use of portable Goalball Packagoals from Packaworld to allow the game to be played ‘for real’ by an audience that might not otherwise experience it.

While the game is primarily played by visually impaired athletes, the ‘Have a Go’ event introduced the game to the entire university community to grow the sport’s profile, offering those without a vision impairment the chance to feel what it’s like the experience the game.

Goalball Western Australia Secretary Karen Paull said the event was the first of its kind at the UWA and went well.

"It was all about inclusion and raising awareness. Some students participated and we also had some come along to watch, to get an idea of what goalball is all about.”

The goals used in a goalball match are 9-metres long and traditionally made from aluminium, making them difficult to transport, move, and set up.

At the UWA Orientation Week event, Goalball Western Australia made use of high-quality inflatable Goalball Packagoals from Packaworld.

The Packaworld goals are the first portable goalball goals in the world, providing a convenient solution to an equipment problem that often holds goalball accessibility back. Made from heavy-duty thermoplastic, they are rigid once inflated and are easy to transport and store.

“We loved the fact that they’re not too heavy or hard to move around,” Ms Paull said. “The wheels on the bag they pack away into are genius And I liked that it wasn’t complicated at all to set up. You’re not trying to slot Part A into Part B or anything, it’s all one piece, and it was really fast to pump up with just a hand pump.”

“Not needing so many people to get them into a venue and being able to get them up quite easily with a couple of people is great.”

The purchase of the new goals was made possible thanks to funding from Paralympics Australia, to help promoting and grow the sport throughout Western Australia.

Goalball Western Australia has big plans to use the new goals to run other ‘Have a Go’ events around, including at many schools throughout the state.

In addition to the promotion of the game in schools, Goalball Western Australia will use the goals to run corporate events, offering a unique team-building activity that also teaches what it is like to be vision impaired, possibly even raising funds to help further the game’s development.

Goalball Western Australia has also signalled its intentions to use the Packaworld goals at the Australian Goalball National Championships in 2023, opting for a convenient, portable option for a second court to supplement its primary court that will use aluminium posts.

This week, however, they are back at UWA, gearing up for what promises to be a heated battle between departments.

“This week, we are going back for the inter-faculty competition and expected a strong turnout,” Ms Paull said. “Since the orientation week, I have been carrying the goals around in the back of my car. The other goals, the more permanent ones, I’d never be able to transport so easily.”

Goalball was invented in 1949 as a sport for blinded war veterans and has been played at the Paralympics since the 1976 Paralympic Games in Toronto, Canada. Eligible players at any competitive event need to have only 10 per cent of vision remaining, or a vision field restricted to 20 degrees, and wear blackout googles while playing to level the playing field.

The game is played on an 18 metre by 9 metre court, with teams hurling a ball from one end to the other in hopes off netting a goal in the 1.3-metre-high goal that stretches the court’s entire width. The hard rubber ball used for goalball has two bells inside, which sound out the incoming ball for defending players.

>> Want to know more about our portable goalball goals? Visit our Goalball Packagoals page.