Double Euro delight for roller derby girls

Photo: Begt Persson

Victory celebration by the Rainy City roller derby team.

OLDHAM’s roller derby team has chalked up two victories at a top European tournament.

Hundreds of people attended the event in Malmo, Sweden, which was also streamed live on the internet.

Rainy City entered the competition as underdogs but beat all their predicted scores. They thrashed Oslo Roller Girls 256-95 and Copenhagen Roller Girls 235-95, but were narrowly beaten by the Berlin Bombshells 199-177.

Roller derby is a fast-paced, contact sport played on roller skates. Two teams of five players compete to score the most points, achieved when members called jammers lap their opponents who try to block them.

Rainy City Roller Girls was established in 2008 and was Manchester’s first roller derby team.

Ten teams took part in the WFTDA European Tournament and “Faye-tal Blonde”, vice-captain of the Rainy A-team, said: “We did what we set out to do. We trained hard, we went into the tournament as the underdogs and put our heart and soul into every single game.”

Rainy’s performance at the European tournament means their world ranking could increase from 132 this month. They are raising money to compete in the USA next year.