“Yes!” She answers with great confidence and a big smile. The question to Ya-Wen Lin, one of the stars of Taiwanese korfball, was if she is good enough to play for the national team of the Netherlands, the leading team in the sport for decades, if she was a Dutch citizen. Her coach Fang-Yi Hsieh confirms the powerful statement of her player. “Oh yes, she would easily fit in, for sure.”
At the World Championship korfball in Taipei everyone seems to accept the Netherlands will gain their eight consecutive world title, their eleventh in total. The only one missing is the one in 1991 when the Belgian neighbors won the final. Almost everyone, that is, because Taiwan is dreaming big. “Everyday we think about beating the Netherlands”, says coach Hsieh. “We believe in it.” But they must close a huge, seemingly insurmountable gap. The Dutch are the only professional players in the world, getting challenged in their high quality competition (Korfbal League) every week.
“We will get better if we play more matches on a higher level, but that’s difficult for us”, says Hsieh. “Europe is very far away for us, so we can’t play a lot of international matches. And we don’t have a competition format with korfball clubs in our country. We play – as national team – a few championships with local teams, and that’s it.”
In July the Dutch team came to Taiwan for a training stage. To get used to the country and the vibe of the city and to practice against Taiwan. “We’ve learned so much”, say both coach and player. “For example: the Dutch players are very tall. We need to solve that problem by playing dynamic korfball and by moving around across the field. Off course, we know that already, but we need to practice in real, top-level matches to see how it works out.”
Hsieh believes that if her team gets more chances to play on such a high level, Taiwan can close the gap with the kings and queens of korfball soon. Like mentioned before: she dreams big. “My biggest wish is to send eight players (four men, four women, as korfball is a mixed gender sport with eight players at once on the field, DtG) to the Netherlands to play as a team in the Korfball League. That would be great and raise our level of play really fast.”
Reality check: that’s difficult to achieve. Not only Taiwan needs to find some money/sponsors for such a project, the Dutch korfball federation needs to create a place for the team in their league. And it’s not likely that’s gonna happen.
Clean and quiet
Lin, whose image shines on the big posters of the tournament in the capital of Taiwan, has played in the Dutch competition two times. In the seasons 2015-2016 and 2017-2018 she played for Dalto in Driebergen. “I love the Netherlands. It’s clean and quiet, not so crowded as in Taipei City”, says Lin. “I learned a lot of korfball skills in those years and what was really exciting for me was to play for so many people. The crowd is huge at the matches in the Korfball League. We are not used to that over here.”
Korfball in Taiwan basically exists since 1986. Hsieh was there when the sport took hold on the island. She was a player. In basketball. She laughs: “To be honest: at first I didn’t like korfball at all, haha… I was a basketball player! What was this new sport? But our teacher at university wanted to build a team and as athletes we were picked to join.” A national korfball team was formed and one year later Hsieh, nicknamed Bird after then famous American basketball player Larry Bird, finds herself with her teammates at the world championships in the Netherlands, as part of the very first Taiwanese korfball team.
“People thought we weren’t that good and they ranked us in advance somewhere around place ten in a tournament with twelve competitors”, she remembers. But the Asian players surprised everyone at that tournament. “We became 4th! And I was chosen as female player of the tournament. That’s when I fell in love with korfball. I’ve been to the Netherlands many times since, it feels like my second home.”
Now, in 2023, Taiwan qualified for a unique final. Every other world championship in the history of the game was a match between the mighty Dutch and Belgium. But this time Taiwan beat the Belgian team in a spectacular semi-final (21-19). In the final Lin produces the first goal of the match, the crowd is going insane and hopes for a big surprise, but after the stunning start, the Netherlands show what they got in store and win easily with 27-9.
But there are hopes. For the popularity of the mixed gender sport. “We showed a lot of people our sport, played in front of so many fans. Girls and boys witnessing how great our sport can be.” And earlier this year the next generation of Taiwanese korfball players gave the sport and the country hope on the pitch as well. The national team under 17 years have beaten the Netherlands in their own home in June at the world championships. An upset as never seen before in the international world of korfball. The 29-year old Lin is coach of some of those players. “It shows we’ve got the talent, that everything is possible.” Taiwan is dreaming big and one day – they believe – dreams can come true.