VisiBall from peer to peer
Module 1: Brief history of the game (origin)
When the team, developing the Four-minute barriers, conceived the idea of the project and the grounds of the game, it was moved by several main reasons. The first reason was rooted in the fact that children with visual impairments, integrated in general education schools throughout numerous countries and venues, spend the time for sports at school waiting on a bench or, in the best case scenario, being assigned the task to seek out and return escaping balls. There are very few practical examples, especially in countries such as Bulgaria, Greece and Romania, which show the integrated v.i. student properly included in a physical activity together with or parallel to what their classmates are doing.
The sports teachers at the school for students with impaired vision “Louis Braille” in Sofia, Bulgaria speak of numerous lost generations – young people, who have omitted the chance to develop particular life-important skills, due to the fact that they remained excluded from the sports at the schools where they were “integrated” and they were not provided access to the sports opportunities within the specialized schools. A mixed system, practiced in the UK for example, which does miracles for giving proper chances for personal development and growth to the v.i. children and young people.
The attitude of policy makers towards inclusion in school sports is often discouraging, if not even insulting, both to the physical educators, who specialize in adapted physical activities as well as to the people with v.i. themselves.
With this in mind and in heart, the 4MB team started on the road of demonstrating how wrong this attitude is – by organizing a vast portfolio with physical activities and sports that can be played at school or at various other locations – an, on top of that, adding a new sport, which uses the 5-against-5 futsal at its base, but adding rules, which make sure that the game would be as intriguing and satisfying for both sighted and visually impaired players.
We believe that inclusion at its best should not require substantial and long-term compromises on anyone’s side, because such relations wear out at a certain point and could leave a bitter taste and a sense of loss. This is the reason why the sighted players in our new sport do not wear blindfolds and this again is the reason why we have installed certain requirements for involving the v.i. players in the possession and passing of the ball before a goal can be scored.
All this and much more has been fixed in the rules of the so called "VisiBall" football, played by mixed teams of blind and sighted players, conceptualized by Matteo CURRELI from the CuBuFoundation in Bulgaria within the European “Four-Minutes Barriers: Foster the inclusion of visually impaired youngsters through sport methodologies and sport activities” (FMB | 4MinBs) (2020-2021) (613251-EPP-1-2019-1-BG-SPO-SCP), co-funded by the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union, and developed in collaboration with Inforef (Belgium), Foundation for Development of the Cultural and Business Potential of Civil Society (CuBuFoundation) (Bulgaria), School for Visually Impaired Students "Louis Braille" (Bulgaria), University of Thessaly (Greece), Pirsos Blind Sport Union (Greece), Munster Technological University (Ireland), Quartotempo Firenze ASD (Italy) and Ofensiva Tinerilor (Romania).
The Covid-19 pandemic held us back and caused a delay in the testing of the game, which for quite a while, even if with amazing success, was only practiced in Italy by the local partner Quarto Tempo Firenze. The feedback from the sighted players was that “now we know how to make ourselves seen by visually impaired fellow footballers and we understand so much better the reality of a v.i. person, what they can do and how we can all be of help to each other”. Sighted and sight-impaired players have equally great fun from playing the game. As you will read further down, organizing a VisiBall match is not so hard and can take place in all sorts of locations. The video additions to this MOOC give examples and ideas of where and how the sport can be practiced. Therefore, if you have a network of supporters around you, if you feel that football can be “your thing” and if you know at least a few other sight impaired and sighted friends who would like to play, check out this MOOC further and then make sure you contact the closest and most convenient partner or project beneficiary in order to find out where you can start practicing and playing.
Module 2: How to get started playing VisiBall?
If you would like to organize a proper game of VisiBall, you need to be aware of the requirements towards the court, the game play and the scoring.
The court
As it can be observed in the diagram below, the VisiBall court is a football pitch, measuring a minimum of 38 by 18 meters and a maximum of 42 by 22 meters (the first measurement in both cases fixes the length of the pitch and the second measurement – the width).
The goal itself is 3 meters wide and 2 meters high.
The rectangle area around the goal is marked with A on the diagram and represents the Goalkeeper’s area. Its measurements are 5.82 meters wide and 3 meters deep. That is the area within which the respective goalkeeper can move and play the ball.
A wider area in front of the goal, marked with B, is the Penalty area. It is a semicircular area (marked with a B on the diagram) which includes the goalkeeper’s area and in which the penalty kick is taken against the team committing a foul.
Then comes the Penalty disc, marked with C on the diagram, which is drawn 6 meters from the midpoint between the goal and equidistant from it.
The Free-throw disc is marked with D on the diagram and is drawn on the field 8 meters from the midpoint between the posts and equidistant from them.
A very important point is marked with E – this is the position of the person in the team filling the role of Guide. The Guide is the person directing the advancing v.i. players towards the opponents‘ goal in order to help them locate the position of the opposing team's goal and keep them safe by warning them of any danger. The Guide may only speak when the ball is in the offensive half of their team's field. Sighted footballers cannot give verbal indications to blind players, but can only announce their position with the word "voy" when they move near a blind player of any of the 2 teams with the intention of avoiding dangerous clashes. The sound ball is informally a mobile guide inside the field.
The last two important parts of the court are the defensive guide area and the offensive guide area. The Defensive Guide area is the part of the field, in which the goalkeeper acts as defensive guide by giving directions to their blind teammates during a defensive action; it matches the entire half of the field, in which their team defends. The Offensive Guide area is the part of the field in which the Guide, located at point E, acts as offensive guide by giving directions to their blind teammates during an offensive action; it matches the entire half of the field in which their team attacks.
VisiBall can be played in various locations – in school gyms with living human-barriers holding hands on the sides of the field or in professional sports locations with perfect conditions. The requirements according to the rules state those perfect conditions we speak of, however, we need to make one important point – even if your setting is not perfect, whether you are sight impaired player or a coach, playing the game, in a safe mode of course, is very important. Getting sighted and v.i. children to play a game together in the first place is what matters! Bringing it to a professional level is a next level, a bonus. Getting the conditions to their perfect status should be planned carefully and implemented in order to guarantee sustainability and longevity of the initiative.
Players
If you want to play a match or organize a match of VisiBall, you need 2 teams, formed by 5 players (1 sighted goalkeeper, 1 or 2 blind players and 3 or 2 sighted players), 1 Guide and 1 coach. Each team has a captain, representing their team during the match and being in charge of addressing the referee and other officials; they must strive to maintain good conduct and sportsmanship within the team; to be recognized among their teammates, the captain should wear a band on one arm.
Each team is allowed a maximum of 6 players on the bench, available for substitutions and it is the coach’s decision whether someone needs to be substituted and only the coach may ask the referees to interrupt the game by time-out.
The goalkeeper can move exclusively inside their own goalkeeper area of 5 by 3 meters and can use shoulders, arms, forearms or hands to play the ball; only sighted people can play the role of goalkeeper; the goalkeeper cannot leave the goalkeeper area, otherwise there is a penalty kick for the opposing team and a cumulative foul.
The visually impaired footballer can move around the entire playing field without constraints; both sighted and blind players are prohibited to use shoulders, arms, forearms or hands to touch the ball.
Duration of the game
1 match has 2 half-times of 25 minutes each, with 1 break at the end of each half-time and time-outs called by the teams' coaches. Each break has a duration of 10 minutes. Each time-out has a maximum duration of 2 minutes.
Scoring
There are certain pre-goal conditions and requirements towards the positioning of the players of each team on the field, which are presented in details in the Handbook, which you can access from the project web-site and/or download here.
If victory is on your mind, then you should know that like with all other types of football, the team that scores the most points at the end of the match wins. A team gains 1 point every time the ball crosses the goal line, defended by the opposing team, 3/4 of the way.
Auto-goals are possible here as well and they give a point to the opposing team. There are no pre-goal conditions in case of auto-goals.
Each player on the field has the possibility to score a goal, provided that their team has reached the pre-goal condition.
Rules
It is important to understand that in order for the game to be inclusive, the sighted players need to agree to certain requirements they should oblige, guaranteeing that the game is progressing with the effective and fruitful participation of the blind players. Thus, for example a blind player may tackle a sighted player who is in ball possession, while a sighted player may not tackle a blind player who is in ball possession. Also, which is extremely important, a sighted player may not place himself in the trajectory of a shot of the blind player, otherwise a cumulative foul will result.
For checking the full list of rules, consult the Handbook.
Module 3: Basic Equipment
A bell ball
For playing VisiBall a rumble ball is essential - a sonorous ball containing rattles that produces a sound that enables blind players to understand the position of the ball and orient themselves on the field. An image of a sonorous ball is given here below.
Obscuring masks
The visually impaired players, when they are active on the field, need to wear obscuring masks. These are self-adhesive eye patches with a minimum size of 7 by 5 centimeters on both eyes and, in addition, must wear obscured protective masks; the masks must be fixed so that the player cannot see anything; masks must be worn regardless of the blindness level of the player. Some of the tests of the game used goalball masks for the purpose.
Protective helmets
Considering the chances of collision between sighted and v.i., as well as between v.i. players, the latter need protective helmets, including nasal septum, such as the one on the image below:
Side Walls
In the best-case scenario, the court you will be playing VisiBall on will have barriers, which delimit the lateral edges of the field up to 1 meter over the end of each side so as to prevent the ball and the players from leaving the sides of the field. Without a concrete constraint on the movement of players outside the edge of the field, you risk exiting the field without realizing it and stumbling into physical or human obstacles that you cannot see and avoid. For safety reasons, regular rigid barriers need to respect specific standards, namely: made of rigid material, without sharp or blunt edges, in a position stable enough to withstand impact of the ball and players, at least 1.5 meters high and with a maximum inclination of 10 degrees to the line perpendicular to the ground. Such barriers are commonly used in 5-against-5 Blind Football.
VisiBall has however also seen live-barriers made of humans, students holding hands. Even if it is not your best choice, if you have everything else installed – referees, goals, court size, well prepared guides, helmets for protection – then you can also go for this type of “human-barrier” game-play in order to experience and enjoy VisiBall.
Module 4: 7 sample exercises to develop basic football skills for v.i. players
Exercise n. 1: Confidence
Confidence plays a fundamental role in sports as well as in the lives of people with visual impairments. Often a blind or severely visually impaired child or young person grows up in a social environment, where the child is considered to need help, care and attention to undertake most daily activities. The perpetuation of this condition for years may develop a series of fears and insecurities mainly due to the child's lack of experience or lack of confidence in themselves. This will impact their participation in social activities such as sport activities, as in many cases they might consider it dangerous for their physical safety or full of insurmountable obstacles to overcome.
In this sense, the fundamental question that anyone involved in sport for the visually impaired must ask themselves is: how can sports help to overcome this barriers and thus contribute to improve the living conditions of blind and severely visually impaired people? In order to answer this difficult question, it is important to stress that all sports contribute to increasing the self-esteem and confidence of the person, but there are some that, due to the complexity and dynamics of development, require both the athlete and the technical staff, a very detailed and gradual attention and preparation.
VisiBall is an emblematic example from this point of view, as it requires the athlete to move quickly within a pitch of play that is bordered by side walls, but rather wide and in total autonomy, guided by the remote voice indications of sighted teammates and guides.
The blind or visually impaired person has the opportunity to experience trust in others because on the pitch they do not use aids and the instructions of the guides and sighted teammates are often necessary for their physical safety as well as for achieving a football result. Trust therefore becomes the cornerstone of this game, and the process of acquiring mutual trust between sighted and blind people is so essential that it goes beyond the field of sports.
So how can we help break down the mental barrier that prevents the blind or severely visually impaired from running freely over a greater or lesser area?
STEP 1) It is necessary to start working with the future player using tactile knowledge, to discover the geometric characteristics of the five-a-side football pitch. To do this, we would need a piece of cardboard, a piece of string and some pins. With the string we will draw the perimeter of the pitch, the lines delimiting the nerve centers (the halfway line, the line and the penalty area, etc.) and also the two-dimensional shape of the two goals, fixing them to the card with the pins. Then we will illustrate our tactile design to our future players.
STEP 2) We will move to the court and lead them by the hand inside the playing field, and we will ask them to count the steps to make them aware of the actual dimensions of the pitch, both in length and width.
STEP 3) Then we start to distance ourselves from them by a few meters and ask them to join us following our voice. The exercise has to be repeated several times increasing progressively the distance to cover and varying the direction in which to make the person move.
STEP 4) We will place the person in the long side of the pitch making them familiar with the side bank. Then we place the person on the opposite side of the pitch and ask them to walk towards us following our voice. The same exercise should be repeated in a similar way walking the length of the pitch. Then progress increasing the pace. In both cases, at the beginning of the exercise you should accompany the person holding their hand. Then repeat all the previous exercises at a faster pace.
STEP 5) Then you should train the person to draw an ellipse with the run that will be progressively enlarged. Two operators (assistants) will be the vertexes of an ellipse that the blind player will have to run around in the most proximal way possible.
STEP 6) Later, a slalom is proposed between assistants (also called operators) who will gradually indicate their position; at first the person will be asked to walk the route and then run. Then the operators will be replaced by foam rubber dummies and the blind player will be guided in the slalom by the voice of an operator placed at the end of the path.
STEP 7) Another useful exercise to increase the person's confidence and train their reflexes could be a longitudinal run of the pitch with human obstacles unknown to the blind player that will signal their vocal presence a few meters away from the person forcing them to change direction to avoid colliding with them.
Exercise n. 2: Psychomotricity
The aim of the practice is to identify psychomotor skills to support the psychomotor development of players.
The aim of this first point is to apply to a visually impaired person the so-called “Tactile Method", a method whose primary objective is to increase the person's knowledge of their own body. In this case, the blind player is accompanied by an operator who stands about 30/40 centimeters away from them. In a first variant, the operator will touch one of the person's limbs and ask them to raise the opposite limb at the same time. In a second variation, the practitioner will touch the person's upper limb and ask them to raise the ipsilateral lower limb and vice versa. Finally, in a third variation, the practitioner touches a part of the person's body and asks them to touch the same part with the opposite limb."
This exercise can also support coaches to lead players not only to train motor skills, but also relational, cognitive and emotional skills.
Exercise n. 3: Coordinative skills without equipment
A: In this first exercise, the operator stands in front of the blind player and explains the exercise verbally, trying to be as descriptive and exhaustive as possible. The blind player has to try to stay in balance for about 5 seconds, alternating each time right foot on the ground/left arm up and vice versa. Before proceeding with the practical test, the operator will assume the static position of the exercise and will invite the person to touch it so that he/she can have a tactile as well as verbal representation of the gesture that he/she will have to perform. Only then can the person move on to action.
B: In this second exercise, the blind player will have to perform a series of frontal leaps, always alternating the combinations of right foot in support/left arm forward and vice versa, remaining each time in balance for 5 seconds. Again, the same methodology is used as described above.
C: In this last exercise, the blind player must learn to crawl on the ground. Also in this case, in order to understand the movement to be performed, which consists in alternating the flexion of the right knee and the simultaneous extension of the left arm and vice versa in order to move forward on the ground, it is essential to follow the three steps described above.
Exercise n. 4: Coordinative skills with equipment
A: In this first exercise, the operator is placed in front of the blind player and has a sound ball in their hand. The operator rolls the ball in the direction of the blind player, who has to hear the sound, pick it up and throw it with their hands towards the operator.
B: In this exercise there are two blind people, and they are placed in a space of ground delimited by four sighted operators who are placed at the vertices of what will become, for the blind, a sound square. Each operator has a sound ball in their hand, which he shakes to signal to the two blind people their position and, at the same time, their position inside the square. The blind should run freely inside the square and, whenever one of the operators calls their name, they should go towards them, touch them, and immediately run back into the square.
C: In this exercise the blind player is required to perform a bell-ball domination on the spot. The operator, who stands at a distance of about 2 meters from the person, will at some point touch them, and the blind player will have to make a complete circle around the ball and then, trying to find it again, start the domination again.
D: In this exercise, three operators will stand at the vertices of a triangle in which the blind player will be placed. The operators will signal their name and, consequently, their position to the blind player who, when one of them starts, will begin to turn around. When one of the guides says stop, the blind player will have to indicate where he thinks each of the three guides is.
Exercise n. 5: Decision-making skills
A: In this exercise, three operators make up a sound triangle by placing themselves at the vertices of the triangle, each of them holding a sound ball. Each time one of the operators shakes the ball and makes it sound, the blind player must immediately move towards the sound until they reach it.
B: As a second situation, there are two operators facing each other at a distance of 10 meters. In the middle of this space between the two operators is the blind player. Each of the two operators holds a sound ball and a bell. By continuously shaking the ball, the two operators produce situation of sound stress for the blind player, who must remain still until they hear one of the two guides ring the bell. Only then the blind player should move as fast as possible towards the bell.
C: In a third variation, an operator holds a sound ball in their hand and shakes it continuously while running across the pitch. The blind player should chase it and try to catch it. This last exercise can only be carried out when there are sidelines marking the pitch. The exercise consists of a series of sprints at maximum speed from one side of the pitch to the other by a blind player, who will be assisted by two guides who will stand behind each side of the pitch.
Exercise n. 6: Ball handling from standstill position
Improving technical and coordination skills using the ball on the spot.
A: The coach explains to the blind player the concept of ball conduction. The ball has to bounce between the inside right foot and inside left foot of the player continuously with the help of alternating arm movements. The coach asks the blind player to simulate running on the spot by adding the alternating movement of the arms (right foot on the ground, left arm forward and left arm backward and vice versa); then he introduces the sound ball and invites the blind player to repeat the exercise several times. The coach introduces the concepts of clockwise and anticlockwise using tactile signals to represent the clock. The coach asks the blind player to move clockwise and anticlockwise, first without the ball and then leading the ball in a bell shape. Finally the blind player has to lead the bell-shaped ball on the spot alternating, according to the coach's instructions, the speed of the conduction (slow, normal, fast).
B: The coach demonstrates and makes the blind player perform a series of exercises on the spot that refine their individual technique, increase the sensitivity of their feet with respect to the perception and control of the ball and improve their arm-leg coordination.
Touches: jumps on the ball, alternating feet and arms. They can be frontal, when the ball is placed in front of the person performing the exercise, and lateral, when the ball is placed between the person's feet. The exercise should be performed initially on the spot and then with the clock technique described in the previous point.
Roll: Passing the ball from one foot to the other using the sole.
V-call: The coach draws a V in the palm of the blind player's hand to outline its shape. Then he asks the blind player to draw the same shape three-dimensionally with the ball using the sole and the inside of the foot, both with the right and the left.
L-call: Same way as in the previous exercise to draw a different shape.
Swing: The coach asks the blind player to make a torso twist accompanied by the rest of the body. Then the ball is introduced and the blind player is asked to perform the same action with the ball between the feet using the inside foot.
Exercise n. 7: Ball handling in motion
A: In this exercise, the blind player is free to move around a playing surface with a sound ball between their feet while conducting a bell-shaped ball. The coach has to alternate, by means of vocal indications, the speed of the ball conduction (slow, normal, fast).
B: A first variation on the change of rhythm is the stop and restart. Whenever the coach says stop, the blind player must stop the ball with their sole, preferably trying to alternate left and right feet, and start off again immediately.
C: A second variation is the so-called ball sleep. The blind player leads the ball and whenever the coach says "I'm", he must stop the ball with their sole and keep it still, then silence it, for a few seconds and start again.
Q: A third variation is the change of direction. The change of direction consists in the fact that a ball carrier succeeds in going in the opposite direction from the one he was moving previously, and that he succeeds in doing so without stopping their conduction of the ball. The blind player will therefore conduct the ball in the bell until the coach invites them to change direction. At that point, with the sole rather than the inside or outside of their right or left foot, he will have to make a substantial turnabout with the ball. If, on the other hand, we are talking about a change of direction, exactly with technical gestures similar to those used for the change of direction, the blind player will have to choose a different direction than the one he was moving towards (right/left) and proceed towards the chosen direction.
E: This last variation takes place in a group. There is a group of 3/4 blind people inside a square delimited at its vertices by 4 operators. Each of the operators has a sound ball in their hand, which should be shaken throughout the exercise to constantly signal to the blind inside their position. Each blind player inside the square has a sound ball in their hands. The blind must be able, for a period of time determined by the coach, to lead the ball inside the square and not collide with each other by signaling each other vocally using the international term "voy".