This is serious business.
Inspired by the sport played by throughout the wizarding world in JK Rowling’s Harry Potter books, Quidditch has become a popular real-world game in recent years, with teams across the globe competing against one another.
In the Goblet of Fire, the Irish Quidditch team won the World Cup — so we’ve got quite a reputation to live up to here in the real world.
The Irish Quidditch Cup will be the decider for which team will go and compete in the European Quidditch Cup in Poland in April 2019. Which is like the Euros, but for Quidditch. Three teams will go head to head for the trophy, which serves as both a national title and the qualification process for the Euros.
The teams involved are:
- Dublin Draíochta Dragons, a community team based in Dublin.
- Mid-leinster Moontrimmers, a community team located in Tullamore.
- Limerick Lycans, a university team based in Limerick
The event, which will be held in Trinity College, Dublin on 12 January, will be free for the public to attend.
And let’s be real, we can’t be any worse at Quidditch than we currently are at football, so we may as well get behind the team.
In case you’re not clear on the rules of real-world Quidditch, we’ve got a handy breakdown for you right here.
A quidditch team consists of 21 athletes with seven players per team on the field at any one time. Each player has a broom between their legs. The four maximum rule of Quidditch states that at most there can be four players of the same gender on pitch at one time. This ensures that the game is mixed gender and inclusive to all.
Players can be one of four positions:
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Keepers – Guard the hoops from opposing chasers and become a 4th chaser on offence.
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Chasers – Throw the quaffle through the opposite team’s hoops to score goals worth 10 points.
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Beaters – Throw bludgers at the opposing team to ‘knock them out’ and make them return to hoops.
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Seekers – Catch the snitch (worth 30 points) to end the game.
A team of seven will have one Keeper, three Chasers, two Beaters and one Seeker. A game of quidditch involves three types of balls:
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The Quaffle – a semi-deflated volleyball thrown through the hoops by chasers and keepers.
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Bludgers – dodgeballs thrown at other players by beaters. There are three bludgers on the pitch.
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The Snitch – a sock with a tennis ball in it, attached to the snitch runner’s shorts. When caught by either team’s seeker, the game ends.
For more information, click here.
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