IWGA Athlete of the Month December 2014
Congratulations to the Men’s Floorball Team from Sweden, IWGA Team of the Month for December 2014. The men from Sweden secured the World Floorball Championship title in Gothenburg, Sweden. The defending champions achieved the title with a 3-2 win over Finland.
Sweden present a team that didn’t stop believing in their ultimate dream even when Finland took an early 2-0 lead in the first period of the final. Instead of feeling frustrated, they raised their game to meet the expectations of over 12.000 spectators in a sold-out arena. Sweden took the championship for the home crowd, when Henrik Stenberg scored the winning goal with only one hand on the stick.
The Swedish National Floorball Team is maybe one of the best ever teams to have won a World Championships. It has now won two consecutive World Championship titles in a row. Moreover, it won gold at eight out of ten championships. Sweden will be very hard to beat in the coming World Championships and The World Games 2017 in Wroclaw/Poland.
During the tournament in Gothenburg, the team succeeded because of a remarkable combination of ultimate stick-handling skills, goal-oriented forwards, hard defenders and solid goalkeeping. The squad also took advantage of the pressure from the frantic home audience in the final in the end.
In addition, the team has been a really good ambassador for the sport and the tournament in Swedish media, meeting up with the fans in the arena after each game and taking part in a number of social causes during the event, such as visiting a children’s hospital during the tournament to greet the young patients.
Three players from Sweden were elected to the All Star Team. Martin Östholm was selected as one of two “best defenders”, and Rasmus Enström and Kim Nilsson as two of the three “best forwards”.