Participants of the World Floorball Championships 2014 will be decided in qualifications at the end of January. One of the six regional qualification tournaments will be played in Valmiera, Latvia on 28th January – 1st February 2014. Five teams will take part in this tournament – Norway, Latvia, Hungary, Italy and Liechtenstein. As the third participant we introduce – Team Norway.

 

Norway is currently ranked 5th in the IFF Rankings which are based on standings in two previous World Floorball Championships (WFC). It’s the highest ranked team in this qualification group. Norway along with Latvia are clear pre-tournament favorites for the first two places. In all WFC tournaments Norway has showed very stable performance never finishing lower than 7th. The best result was bronze in WFC 1996, since then Norway has never made semi-finals again.

 

Team Manager of Norway Lars Bunaes: “The Norwegian team has two main objectives in the WFCQ. First of all to qualify for the Final Round and preferably win the tournament. The international level of play has improved a lot over the last years and each match will be equally important and difficult to win. Our other objective is to improve on our game plan and have progress in individual skills and team performance. We are very pleased with signing Kent Goransson, as a coach, when our former coach retired. Kent has experience working with Warberg and the Swedish National team, and he is now also Manager of Helsingborg. The players are a good mix of very experienced one's and some debutants. Our team prepared for the WFCQ with “Salming Invitational” tournament in September and a training camp in November.”

 

17 players on the National team are playing in Norwegian Championships, with the majority coming from “Tunet IBK” (5 players) and unbeaten season leaders “Slevik IBK” (5 players). 3 players are playing in Sweden, with Ketil Kronberg and Daniel Gidske representing Swedish Super League (SSL) clubs. Kronberg with 35 points in 18 matches is currently 6th on the SSL top scorers list.

 

Another notable player on the roster is Willy Fauskanger – the only player to play in all 9 Men’s WFC. He is currently IFF record holder for most matches (48) and most goals (50) in WFC history.

 

Team roster:

 

Number	Player	Position	Club
3	Daniel Gidske	Defender	Mullsjo AIS (SWE)
4	Sindre Bjerknes	Forward	Tunet IBK
5	Ketil Kronberg	Forward	IBK Dalen (SWE)
7	Lars Erik Torp	Forward	Greaker
9	Kenneth Skistad	Defender	Greaker
10	Ole Mossin Olesen	Forward	Tunet IBK
11	Geir Vidar Pedersen	Defender	Slevik IBK
12	Christoffer Nilsson	Forward	Arvika (SWE)
15	Thomas Ihle	Forward	Haugerud
16	Willy Fauskanger	Forward	Fredrikstad
17	Philip Dessingthon	Defender	Tunet IBK
21	Thomas Straete	Forward	Slevik IBK
22	Patrick Martinsen	Defender	Sveiva IB
23	Jonas Gustavsen	Defender	Slevik IBK
26	Erik Nielsen	Defender	Baekkelaget
28	Fredrik Eriksen	Forward	Tunet IBK
29	Kristian Skaftnes	Forward	Slevik IBK
30	Christer Ronnmark	Goalkeeper	Tunet IBK
33	Glen Evensen	Forward	Slevik IBK
35	Andreas Falkeid	Goalkeeper	Gjellerasen IF

 

Head Coach: Johnny Petersen

Coach: Kent Goransson

Coach: Pal Syversen

Physiotherapist: Bjornar Nilsen

Material Keeper: Morten Andersen

Team Manager: Lars Bunaes

 

Norway will play the first match on 29.01. against Hungary. Full game schedule can be found here.

 

In each qualification group teams play each other once. In 4 European groups two best teams from each qualification group and the two best 3rd placed teams will qualify for the Final Round played in Gothenburg, Sweden on 5th -14th December 2014.