Beach Soccer History

Beach Soccer (also known as Sand Soccer and Beach Football), is taking the sporting world by storm. Played on a sand pitch measuring 28x37 metres, it focuses on some of the most spectacular aspects of modern football: skill, agility and, above all, goals. And if that's not enough, the unique party atmosphere enjoyed by a beach soccer crowd is maintained during the three-minute breaks between periods, when music and bikini-clad dancing girls keep the entertainment flowing!

The origin of beach soccer can be traced back to the beaches of Brazil where impromptu games would be organised among the locals. In 1992 the laws of the game were formalised and a pilot event was staged in Los Angeles. The following summer, the first professional beach soccer competition was organised at Miami Beach, with teams from the USA, Brazil, Argentina and Italy taking part.

In April 1994 the first event to be covered by network television transmissions was held on the Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro and the city hosted the inaugural Beach Soccer World Championship one year later. The competition was won by the host nation, making Brazil the first ever World Champions of Beach Soccer.

The success of the tournament saw commercial interest begin to match developments on the pitch and growing demand for the sport around the world gave rise to the Pro Beach Soccer Tour in 1996. Interest generated by the tour in Europe led to the creation of the European Pro Beach Soccer League (EPBSL) in 1998, providing a solid infrastructure that would increase the professionalism of the spectacle on all levels. The EPBSL, now known as the Euro BS League, united promoters from across the continent and satisfied the demands of the media, sponsors and fans. Only four years on from its creation, the successful first step in the building of a legitimate worldwide competition structure for the sport of Pro Beach Soccer had been taken.

The next four years would see this growth consolidated by further progress both on and off the pitch, with the EPBSL emerging as the strongest Pro Beach Soccer competition in the world. By 2004, some seventeen nations had entered teams, contributing to vastly expanded television coverage of the series and unprecedented demand from promoters in more than seventy countries looking to stage events.

Such interest has allowed BSWW (Beach Soccer Worldwide - the sports governing body) to strike major sponsorship deals with internationally renowned companies including McDonalds, Coca-Cola and MasterCard. Recognition has also come from FIFA, who have cited BSWW as the major entity behind the creation and growth of Beach Soccer, forming a highly promising partnership that saw the first ever FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup take place in Brazil in May 2005.

In addition to the professional tournaments, there are many amateur events organised around the world.

Guest Post from Mike Thomas of http://www.beachsoccer-online.com/

Info about Beachsoccer-online.com:

From a personal point of view, my interest in beach soccer began in July 2000 when I attended an event in Richmond, near London (as a Manchester United fan, the appearance of Eric Cantona was a key factor in my decision to attend the event). The following year, I attended the UK leg of the EPBSL at Hyde Park. It was at this event that the idea of a website was discussed and shortly afterward beachsoccer-online.com was launched.

In 2002 and 2003, the UK hosted European Beach Soccer League tournaments in Brighton and beachsoccer-online.com covered both events from the pressbox and pitchside. Two years of disappointent then followed with no UK-based events. In 2006 I covered the UK event in Birmingham.

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