The women's floorball team Piranha Chur have the chance to win their first title in five years on Saturday. Ex-captain Seraina Hofbauer, formerly Ulber, explains what has changed in Chur.
22.02.2025, 04:30
22.02.2025, 08:30
SDA
The 2025 floorball cup finals are all about new editions. The men from Rychenberg Winterthur want to get their revenge on Zug in Bern on Saturday, while the women from Kloten-Dietlikon will face long-time rivals Piranha Chur, who have now been waiting five years for a title after a golden era.
The clash between Zug United and Rychenberg Winterthur is a rematch of the 2024 final, which Zug won 9:5. And it is a summit meeting: Double winners Zug, who continue to thrive on the extra class of their foreign reinforcements and have the best three scorers in the league in Albin Sjögren, Sami Johansson and Miko Kailiala, lead the championship one round before the playoffs. HC Rychenberg Winterthur, which has been led by national player Manuel Maurer since this season, is in 3rd place after winning the qualifiers in the pre-season.
Only mediocre
The women's final between Piranha Chur and Kloten-Dietlikon is also a rematch, albeit one with a different complexion. Four times between 2017 and 2020, the two teams decided the cup winner between themselves in the final. However, while Kloten-Dietlikon won the Cup titles 10 and 11 in 2022 and 2024 and have remained on the throne in the championship since 2019, Piranha Chur slipped into mediocrity.
The Graubünden club won seven championship titles between 2010 and 2018 and have also reached the play-off and super final four times since 2011. But the 2020 Cup win was the last title, and the 2022 Super Final the last final.
What happened in Chur? In their heyday, Piranha's successes seemed almost a foregone conclusion. Exceptional players such as Sabrina Arpagaus and Mirca Anderegg led the team to its first championship titles since 1990, when it was still BTV Chur. Flurina Marti, Seraina Ulber and Corin Rüttimann, three locals who were still in the early stages of their successful careers when they won their first title in 2010, kept the club at the top in the following years.
A momentum of its own developed in the wake of these draught horses. Other players from the club's own youth ranks such as Lara Heini, Sonja Putzi, Katrin Zwinggi and Chiara Gredig joined in at a high level. The prospect of success also attracted big names such as Nathalie Stadelmann and top international players to Chur and Anderegg back home.
The lost spirit
In the course of the last major upheaval and the professionalization of the competition, the flowing process came to a standstill. Ulber retired in 2020, Marti in 2022. Rüttimann returned to Piranha from Sweden in 2021, but ended his career with Zug the previous year, while national goalie Heini has been playing in Sweden since 2018.
Luana Rensch and Nicole Capatt, both 24 years old, are two home-grown players of high caliber in the current team. But the drive from back then is no longer the same. There is a lack of leaders with the willingness to perform and sacrifice of their predecessors. Also because two of the most promising talents, Marcia Wick and Laila Ediz, moved to Zurich early on and joined Kloten-Dietlikon.
The golden generation opened many doors and made a lot possible, says Seraina Ulber and Hofbauer, who also had a lot of responsibility in the national team before retiring in 2020. Over the years, new talents from every age group joined the team, and Piranha Chur was a top address for world-class players from abroad. Today, however, the spirit is no longer the same, says the 105-time Swiss international, who is married to former national team player Christoph Hofbauer and has two children. "The will to subordinate everything to floorball is no longer there to the same extent as it was in our day."
None of the leading players from the last final team, the one that reached the Super Final in 2022, will still be around in February 2025. Rensch and Capatt, who were part of the team three years ago alongside other players born in 2000 or younger, were unable to completely fill the gaps. In the last season before the merger with the men to form Floorball Chur United, Piranha is in 7th place in the championship just before the playoffs. Reaching the cup final thanks to victories against favored league rivals Zug and Emmental Zollbrück is already a success for the young team.
The club is still in a solid position, the differences between seventh and first in the table are no longer as great as they used to be, and the merger marks the start of a promising new era. But if Saturday's big surprise in the Wankdorfhalle in Bern against the defending champions and new series champions Kloten-Dietlikon fails to materialize, the 0:9 in the 2022 Super Final will remain as a turning point.
