Tennis

Tennis is a ball sport, which comes from a French sport, called “Jeu de Paume”, which means “play with hand”. They batted the ball against a wall, which was on one side, so it flew over the net. On the other side, the audience sat and observed. This game, mostly was played in abbeys. The actual name “tennis” came from the old word “tennes”, which means hold.



The tennis field is 22m long and 11m wide: In the middle, there is a net.



In general, you need to try, not to let the ball touch the ground. If it does, the other person or team gets a point. The points are counted in a difficult way. If you have 5 points and the others are with two points behind, you get an “ultimate point”. It is counted like this: 5 - 10 – 15 - 30 - 40 – 1 point. Normally you play until 5 points are reached. If the ball hits the outside, the team, which didn’t get it out, gets a point.
Then there are two types of games: Single and double. In a single game the players just use the internal field.
In a double, the whole field is used. After every point, which go made the players change their positions.




I really like the game: I even play it. It is interesting and fast, which makes it really much fun.

Sources: All pictures are downloaded from Wikipedia.

POKER: POKING YOUR BRAINS AND WALLETS

Poker is a five-card game which uses normal cards and money represented by tokens. It is different from other card games where, instead of playing all the cards out, the players bet as to who holds the best card combinations until:
1. A showdown where the person with the best cards wins.
2. All but one player have dropped out of the game.
Each player gets two cards and three cards are laid down and are counted as the last three cards for each player. The best combinations of cards from highest to lowest include:
1. Straight flush- AKQJ10 or 5432A.
2. Four of a kind- K-K-K-K.
3. Full house- Q-Q-Q-4-4.
4. Flush- J- 9- 8- 7- 3.
5. Straight- 10- 9- 8- 7- 6.
6. Three of a kind, threes, triplets and trips- 7-7-7-x-y.
7. Two pair- Q-Q-9-9-x.
8. One pair- 3-3-x-y-z.
9. High card- no combination; the highest card wins.
The history of Poker is thought to have evolved over more than ten centuries from various games, all involving the basic principals of ranked card or domino combinations and the use of ‘bluffing’ to deceive opponents. One popular belief is that a game similar to poker was first invented by the Chinese sometime before 969 A.D, when The Emperor Mu-tsung is reported to have played "domino cards" with his wife on New Years Eve.

Checkers: a History

Checkers is a popular board game played in both America and England. The game is played on an 8x8 checkered board. Hence the name, Checkers. It is also called Draughts in England. The players begin by arranging 24 flat, wooden, cylindrical disks into piles of red and black. The players then arrange them on the checker board into the starting position seen here:













The row closest to the player is referred to as the “king’s row”. The darker color (contrary to chess) moves first. There are 2 ways to move: a simple diagonal move to an adjacent square or a jump, which is a move directly adjacent to an opponent’s square. Then the player would then “jump over” the opponent’s checker in a diagonal move to an empty square opposite to the opponent’s square. The square’s checker is then captured and added to the capture bin. When a piece moves to the opponent’s side, it is “kinged” and it is then known as a “king” which can move backwards. You win when you have captured the entire opponent’s checkers.

The History of Checkers dates back to the Mesopotamian cultures of 3000 BC. However this early form of Checkers used a different board with a different number of checkers and no one is sure of the rules. The next development in checkers was “Alquerque“an ancient Egyptian game which dates back to 1500 BC which used a 5x5 board. This variation was played in Europe for several hundred years. Around 1100 AD, a Frenchman had the idea of putting 12 pieces on an 8x8 board, called "Fierges" or "Ferses" it was soon brought to England and then later, America.

In my opinion, this game is unbelievably simple, which is why I prefer Chess over checkers because you need a brain to think strategically rather than simple guess work. However, this is still a viable way of passing time.

Handball

Handball is a modern team sport. Handball is one of the fastest indoor sports. There are
Two different versions of handball - there is an outdoor version called outdoor handball and an inside version called indoor handball. Handball is an Olympic sport played in over 150 countries. You can play handball when you are fit and healthy.

You play handball with 6 court players and one goalkeeper per team. You have to shoot the ball into the goal on the opposite site.
Handball is played on a court 40 long and 20 meters wide. The game is two halves of 30 minutes each. The shots at the goal can reach over 100 km/h per hour. Handball is a game where you catch, jump, shoot, pass and save.
Handball is played with 4 officials.2 referees and 1 time keeper and one score keeper. Two referees are required because the game is so fast. For the 1 penalty you play you get a yellow card. For the second foul you play you have to go out for 2 minutes.



Handball started in the ancient world in Greece but the game wasn’t called handball it was called Urania.The real game Handball started in the 19th century in Berlin as an outside version. The inside version was invented 1906 by a teacher from Copenhagen.


The 21st Handball World cup started on the 1st of February 2009 in Croatia. The current winner of the world cup is France. France won the final against Croatia. France won the world cup already 3 times -1995, 2001 and 2009.

In think that handball is a very interesting and fast game. If you want to play handball you have to very fit and healthy because the sport is fast and you need to be in excellent physical condition.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handball

Hockey

In this article I will write about hockey and the history of hockey.

Hockey is the first of all sports played with an stick, such as cricket and golf. Hockey was not known as hockey until the 18th century. In Inner Mongolia and China people have played Beikow which is a game similar to modern field hockey, for about 1,000 years. Old drawings from Egypt showed hockey. The drawings are about 4,000 years old. The modern game grew from English republic schools in the early 19th century. The first club was in 1849.It was Blackheath in the south-east of London. There are different types of hockey such as: Field hockey, Ice hockey and Indoor hockey. These three types are the most played ones. Hockey was first played at the summer Olympics in 1880 and 1920. The successful hockey teams today are Germany, Netherlands, Spain and Australia. Hockey is a very popular Sport.

That was my small text about Hockey. I like the game very much because it is very interesting.
Source:Sports Hockey Book

The history of chess

Chess was invented in India during the Gupta Empire (280-550 BC) rule. It was first called Caturanga. The Arabs took this game, changed the name and created new rules. The Arabs called it Shatranj. With the conquest of Muslims, armies attacking Persia, the Muslim spread this game till it reached Europe. There the name change many times for example:

• Spain: ajedrez
• Portugal: xadrez
• Greek: zatrikion.

Chess was popular in Europe and the people started to change the rules in Spain and Italy. The game got known
As queen’s chess or mad queen chess
Because the queen was the most powerful figure in the game.

This was the first chess game from the gupta empire (280-550 CE)


The first modern championship was in London in 1851. The winner was a German named Adolf Anderssen. The champion from 2007 on is Viswanathan Anand, he won this title 2 times and is still the champion today.



Even today chess still turns like you see on this picture of a 3 player chess board.

Funny chessboard made.

source: wikipedia