The Edinburgh International Korfball Tournament

Here’s a bit about last year, lest ye forget!

This January, 24 teams from across the UK and Europe traveled to Edinburgh to compete in the Edinburgh International Korfball Tournament. Started by the Edinburgh University Korfball Club in 2003, this tournament has become one of the most popular and prestigious korfball tournaments in the UK.

EIKT is a hugely popular tournament and is fairly unique in that it brings together teams from both universities and city clubs across the UK and Europe. This year 24 places were offered, and the selected teams ranged from as nearby as St Andrews, to as far away as Italy, Portugal and Holland.

Teams arrived on a Friday evening and international bonds were forged at the welcome social at the Three Sisters that evening. However, any hangovers soon dissipated the next morning, with the first games of the group stages commencing early morning at Meadowbank Stadium.

With the group stages complete, visiting teams returned to their hotels or Edinburgh hosts to exchange trainers for dancing shoes before heading out for the true Scottish experience of a ceilidh at Teviot. Despite some near collisions, the evening was a huge success, complete with an almost entirely incoherent rendition of ‘Flower of Scotland’. The visiting teams were then treated to yet another classic and authentic Edinburgh experience in the form of Saturday night Hive.

The Sunday morning saw several more hangovers and slumped bodies around the edge of the hall for a 9am start, but the teams soon recovered and threw themselves into the knock-out stages of the tournament.

A big thanks goes to the referees and organisers of the tournament for making it so successful, and for the teams who traveled from all over Europe to take part.