Shuttleball competitions


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 At present, the unofficial shuttleball games were organized by the Taipei Shuttleball Committee which is led by Mr. Deng. Tanmei Elementary School hosts the official games sponsored by the Department of Education of Taipei City Government. Since Mr. Deng is also a teacher of Tanmei Elementary School, most of shuttleball games are organized by Mr. Deng. As early as 15 years ago, Tanmei Elementary School was the center for promoting shuttleball and the base of the competitions. Although there are fewer and fewer shuttleball teams at present, there are still new school joining the shuttleball sport.

Mr. Deng is a good teacher and a fervent supporter love for shuttleball. He doesn’t have the background in PE, but is highly interested in PE. He is the responsible person of Taipei Shuttleball Committee. Coach You of Xisong Junior High School is a key cadre in the committee. Mr. You contributes a lot to the players and shuttleball games. His job includes selecting national team players through Youth Cup and Chungcheng Cup and leading the national players to go to competitions overseas. Mr. Deng with his fervent favor in shuttleball leads the national team to attend international competitions every year, and sponsored at least 600~900 USD for the players’ expense. The farthest place they went is Hungary. They often go to Hong Kong, Macau, and Guangzhou, China. The competition with the most attendants ever is the Shuttleball Word Cup in Hungary. There are more than ten countries participated at that time.    

Currently the shuttleball competitions are mostly led by China. They tend to be conservative. Many countries recommend that the foot shuttlecock should add a ball at the bottom, but they didn’t change their mind at all. A shuttleball should have a ball underneath, in order to be called a shuttleball.

In order to be well known, the shuttleball should be easy to play. So Mr. Deng and Mother of Shuttleball - Ms. Ming-hsiu Li, have continued to improve the shuttleball for the ease of play and to balance. Whenever Mr. Deng found the situations like the orbit of the shuttleball didn’t go smooth while flying or some people gave recommendations about the shuttleball, they would make adjustment. When the improvement was done, Mr. Deng would announce the new shuttleball as the official shuttleball used in the coming game, and also would ask the manufacturer to make the balls.

Mr. Deng thinks that under the present educational environment in Taiwan, the future development of shuttleball is not positive because very few teachers and parents are willing to lead shuttleball teams. They will still make efforts to promote shuttleball. Tanmei Elementary School, for example, designs the shuttleball courses according to the students’ physical and mental condition. However, the teachers are still in shortage. Taipei Shuttleball Committee holds two training courses for shuttleball judge and coach training. Mr. Deng encourages teachers to attend the courses. He said, “Principal is a key role to promote shuttleball in school. As long as the Principle is willing to do so, more teachers will follow.” They will continue to cooperate with Department of Education of Taipei City Government, together to support the development of shuttleball.