Piara Waters resident Matt Murray, 25, will don the green and gold for the men’s World Floorball Championships in Riga, Latvia from December 3 to 11.
Floorball is a high intensity indoor sport using sticks and a ball similar to indoor hockey.
Mr Murray, a member of the Cannington-based club Western Wolves, came back to the sport five years ago after giving it up in his early teens and he’s glad he did.
He was selected for the qualification squad earlier this year and continued to impress selectors for the world championship squad.
“I was pretty stoked because it’s only my second time playing for Australia, I’d made my debut at the start of the year for qualification for Worlds,” he said.
“I was hoping to retain my spot but there were no guarantees because there were some really skilled players so I was absolutely ecstatic when I got the phone call this time around.”
Mr Murray said the WA Floorball League was small but ultra competitive.
“The league itself is really competitive, in the top men’s division there’s only five teams but the level from first to fifth is pretty consistent,” he said.
“The top four teams all have players going over.”
He said one of the reasons he got back into the sport was the social aspect of it.
“I went back to it for friends to start with, for the social side of things, now it’s my main sport,” he said.
“The community of people because it’s so small still everyone is friends and everyone gets along with each other.
“Even over east the community is so small everyone knows each other, it’s really tight knit.”
Mr Murray said he was training hard for the championships by playing and training five days a week and doing further gym and high intensity workouts.
The Australian team will also head to Europe early this weekend to Helsinki in Finland for a specialist training camp with two professional coaches.
Mr Murray encouraged people interested in floorball to contact his club.
The club plays floorball every Wednesday night at Sevenoaks Senior College.
For more information visit westernwolvesfc.com.
