Kathryn disappeared, returning a few moments later with a young Faejeon woman who wore a pair of black shorts and a dark blue t-shirt, she had her pads on already with her racket under the arm that she had her helmet in, her skates were in her other hand.
"Your Holiness may I introduce you to
Floria Silvana" Kathryn said "She's a bit of a success story with the tribe and is allegedly the best lightball player in the country."
"Pleased to meet you Your Holiness." Floria said
"The Pope's interested in giving the game a try." Kathryn said
"Well my team's up next." Floria said, the game that had been going on had finished "So let's see if we can him some equipment and I'll talk him through it. But I think you should both play."
Finding the Pope equipment was relatively simple as it was similar to being at a bowling alley, just find the right size of skate, gloves, pads and helmet and then let him choose a racket. Floria as would be expected from someone who played away from the drop in sessions had her own equipment. Eventually the Pope was ready to give the game a go. Floria skated next to him around the perimeter of the court so that they could warm up a little, plus it gave her the opportunity to explain the mechanics of the game to the man.
"It's a fast paced contact sport but is remarkably simple to understand." Floria said "Each team has five players usually in the following positions - Keeper, Guard, Centre, Wing, Forward, but there are a variety of different formations. The Keeper as one would guess defends the goal and they are the only player allowed within the circle around the goal, they're also the only player allowed to catch the ball during free play, you may have noticed that they use a slightly different glove than the rest of the team. The Guard is the equivalent of a defender, centre and wing play the equivalent of midfield and forward is as one would expect a forward. A game lasts for five periods of thirty minutes, each side has three time outs for the match plus an extra one if we go to an over time period.
In terms of the rules regarding the ball, you can't catch the ball with your racket and let it lie on it but anything else is ok - forehand, backhand, volley etc, if the ball ends up rolling on the floor then you have to scoop it up with your racket. Also no more than five touches of the ball while stationary at any one time. In terms of scoring you get 10 points for a standard shot which is if I score a goal from anywhere in front of my teams red line on the court, you get 15 points for scoring from behind your teams red line, you get 20 points for scoring while doing an aerial or grind up from a ramp or rail, there's also a bonus 10 points to any of those if you score from behind the opposition goal, that's why the goals have no nets but they use sensors, lights and sirens instead. Most of the fouls are obvious enough as they bear similarities to hockey if you get fouled in front of the oppositions red line then you get a free hit which is sort of like a free kick in football, get fouled behind their red line and it's a penalty shot. The referee can sin bin you for five minutes if you commit a foul or they can send you off, ejecting you from the game, if you commit a serious foul, obviously try to avoid that."
They continued warming up, now doing some basic swings and getting the hang of passing the ball, which was the opposite to the tennis principle, in that game the idea was to, within a set of rules, get the ball past the opponent in this sport you had to pass the ball to each other in a similar way. Kathryn having finally got some equipment was also warming up now.
"Where do you want us to play?" Kathryn asked
"Jenny's in goal and Sara's playing guard" Floria said "Kathryn you play centre, Your Holiness can play forward, I'll play wing. Any questions?"
