If you are playing for fun, you could use any space to play dodgeball in. A space approximately 14 metres long and 9 metres wide is the minimum required space for cloth dodgeball, although more width is never an issue as this means you may be able to fit more than one game inside the same space or play ‘big games’ involving lots of players.
A space approximately 14 metres long and 9 metres wide is most suitable for cloth dodgeball. A centre line should be placed down the middle to separate each team.
Flat floor markers or tape could mark Attack Lines – these lines are used to activate balls after the opening rush or after they have been returned to play from off-court so that eliminations with them count.
If you have a longer room (e.g. 16 metres or more), you may also consider creating a neutral zone. The neutral zone is the space in between two neutral zone lines, and can be 2-4 metres in width. Both teams can entre the neutral zone to make plays, ensuring the necessary length of 7m between throwers and their opponents is kept to.
If you have a wider room, you may be able to fit two dodgeball courts in side by side, meaning you can run two matches at the same time. The size of the room and the target audience would determine if you should lay down a full neutral zone or a centre line only.
Indoor or Outdoor?
Dodgeball can be played indoors or outdoors. You can find lots of fun, outdoor dodgeball festivals using fencing or inflatable courts as well as official competition courts. Indoor spaces with sports-specific flooring are preferable so that players do not risk injury if they dodge to the ground. Enclosed or walled-off spaces are also preferable so that any thrown dodgeballs stay inside a certain area – otherwise balls might spend more time being retrieved from off court than on the actual court being played with.
Adapting Boundary & Retrieval Rules for Casual Sessions
Some dodgeball rules may be adapted for grassroots or recreational settings – these are mapped out in the WDBF Grassroots Rules Adaptations documents. In casual settings where you may not be playing using a full court, you may not wish to adopt technical boundary rules for fear of ruining enjoyment of the game. For that reason, you could keep the rules around lines very simple and forgiving e.g. if players dodge outside the side lines or back lines, they can keep playing, but anyone dodging too far off court (half a metre or more) will get a warning and be called out if they do it again.
If a ball goes off-court, you may allow self-retrieving; this is where players can put their hand up and run off-court to bring the ball back into play. They need to return to court from behind their ball return line or near the back of the court before they can resume playing.
Competition Court
Cloth dodgeball is played on a court which is 14m, 16m or 18m long by 8-9m wide. The largest dodgeball court is 18m x 9m; the same size as a volleyball court.
Safety: All courts should ideally have at least 1 metre of space between the boundary lines and walls or other obstacles to help reduce the risk of players colliding with walls or other objects should they jump off-court. Netting is often placed between courts to stop balls leaving the playing area.
The competition court has been designed for a specific purpose to aid gameplay, so even if you don’t plan on using it in recreational settings, it’s still important to understand the official court.
Task:
Hover over each icon and see what each line represents:
Competition Court Size
The standard British Dodgeball event court is 16m x 9m, as seen in page 1 below. Some adaptions to the court are:
Some high level competitions such as the European Championships or English Super League use a slightly longer 18m x 9m WDBF court. You can see this in page 2 below.
Some entry level competitions such as the Schools Championship events use the slightly shorter 14m x 9m No Neutral Zone court. You can see this in page 3 below.
All courts should have at least 1 metre of space between the boundary lines and walls or other obstacles for safety purposes.
If players of any age group dodge off the side lines or back lines in an official competition setting, they are out immediately. If players are called out, they must join the out box queue in the order that they were eliminated from the game.
Ball Retrieval Rules
If a ball goes off-court, players can not leave the court to retrieve them. Instead, each team has two allocated ball retrievers who must retrieve off-court balls and pass them to players on the court. Ball retrievers can be substitutes, coaches or even club supporters, and usually wear a bib so they can be easily identified.
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