Roller in-line hockey, American roller hockey or inline hockey, is a variant of hockey played on a hard, smooth surface, with players using inline skates to move and ice hockey sticks to shoot a hard, plastic puck into their opponent's goal to score points. The sport is a very fast-paced and free-flowing game and is considered a contact sport, but body checking is prohibited. There are five players including the goalkeeper from each team on the rink at a time, while teams normally consist of 16 players. There are professional leagues, one of which is the National Roller Hockey League (NRHL). While it is not a contact sport, there are exceptions, i.e. the NRHL involves fighting.
Inline hockey players
SKF-Speedy, 1978
Inline-Hockey Puck
Most protective equipment is similar to that used in ice hockey
Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers of players, apparel, and playing surface, they share broad characteristics of two opposing teams using a stick to propel a ball or disk into a goal.
The word "hockey" in Canada, the United States, Russia, and most of Eastern and Northern Europe, typically refers to ice hockey.
Sledge hockey (or "sled hockey") is now called "Para ice hockey". It is the only hockey sport on ice created exclusively for participants with physical disabilities.
Bas relief approx. 600 BC, in the National Archaeological Museum of Athens
Bandy game in Sweden