The Gothenburg Cup has been an extremely important event for IF Warta for almost five decades. But how did it start? And why?  

Warta's long-time board member Sture Jeanson recalls:  

- In the late 1960s, IF Warta began to grow more and more. We were out at camps and tournaments with many good youth teams. We had a special exchange with Baekkelagets SK from Oslo. They had a setup similar to the Wartas, but they also had a top class clubhouse. It was here that we got the idea of how we could get our association to develop.

  - IF Warta's clubhouse contained only one dressing room and that was where the senior players stayed. The young people often had to change at leisure parks, in different garages, in certain attics or perhaps at home. Could we build to our clubhouse? The till was constantly empty and many bills were often paid a little late. Could we raise a small starting amount by organizing our own tournament?

  - We discussed with the Baekkelaget and an association from Copenhagen to start a handball tournament for young people. It would be at the start of the handball season, i.e. at the end of the summer. Since Gothenburg turned 350 in 1971, the tournament could be part of the city's jubilee arrangements, and we therefore decided that the first tournament would take place in Gothenburg. The following year, the tournament would run in the other countries on a rolling schedule. We would therefore be allowed to be an organizer every three years. We thought that the need for handball tournaments for the Nordics was thus covered.

The Gothenburg Cup eventually became more than a handball tournament. In 1980, football and table tennis entered, a few years later chess, floorball, boules, archery, athletics and school trips.

Back to the spring of 1971, a month or so before the registration period was due to expire. Warta's board was nervous at the time. Not a single report had been received.

In the book "IF Warta - an ung 85-åring" Sture Jeanson tells:

  - It is clear that we were worried. There was a lot at stake.

  - Should we blow off the whole arrangement? No, we decided to wait and believe in our idea. We knew from experience that clubs usually send in their registrations at the last minute.

  - And very true: suddenly it rattled. One day we received 180-190 registrations and in the end, we could state that we had 588 participating teams.

A strong contributing factor to the Gothenburg Cup being a success was that Sture Jeanson sat on the School Board.

  - I had many contacts and was able to help us get into the schools. Thus, we were able to arrange accommodation for significantly more people than if we had been referred to clubhouses and youth centers.

  - The participating teams had to buy guest cards, which included food, accommodation, tram journeys, entrance to Liseberg and the museums, Paddanbåtarna, among other things.

  - The Gothenburg Cup gave us a net profit of SEK 300,000, half of the amount the clubhouse cost. We also received an interest- and repayment-free loan from the municipality of SEK 250,000.

On June 17, 1972, Wartagården was inaugurated, the result of the members' efforts in the Gothenburg Cup. Then IF Warta and Handbollspojkarna had merged and became HP Warta.

7,000 girls and boys participated in the Gothenburg Cup in 1971. Number of matches: over 1,200.

Comment from the chairman and competition leader Sven Anzelius, who together with Sture Jeanson and Gösta Rutgersson were driving leaders for many years:

  - Come and talk about the Vasaloppet...

  A few lines in the Göteborgs-Posten: "The Warta management keeps its style in this mammoth competition and does an admirable job with all the thousand things that have to be managed."

The collaboration with Oslo and Copenhagen ended in 1977, but the Gothenburg Cup continued under Warta's auspices, apart from the years 1987-89, when the Swedish Handball Association's Sweden Open was included in our tournament.

Some figures, produced by Sture Jeanson: 588 teams in 1971, 593 teams in 1974 and 368 teams in 1977. In 1980-82, 242 handball teams, 208 football teams, 465 table tennis teams and 30 chess teams took part.

The income from the Gothenburg Cup has decreased drastically in recent years, largely due to the school trips having stopped. But the tournament is still important and every time we visit Wartagården, we can think of the initiative that creative and action-oriented leaders took almost 50 years ago.

  Stefan Thylin