Derby Dodgeball wins Under-13s British Champs 2026 title

Derby Dodgeball claimed the Under-13s British Champs 2026 title at Arena Sport Kettering, with SW Leics Dodgeball Academy Leicester finishing runner-up in a final-stage result that British Dodgeball framed as a national pathway marker for junior talent. The championship formed part of the federation’s 2025/26 programme and sat inside a junior structure built to push players from early competition into the sport’s higher age groups.

British Dodgeball’s junior rules describe that structure as “a sensible pathway,” and the Under-13 bracket is one of four focus age groups alongside under-11s, under-15s and under-17s. That ladder matters because the Under-13 level is where clubs start turning school-age participation into repeat competition habits, with players learning the spacing, ball control and defensive reactions that carry into the next categories.

The Derby result gives the club a clear badge of quality in one of the sport’s most important development divisions. SW Leics Dodgeball Academy Leicester’s second-place finish is equally significant: the Leicester programme has already been recognised as British Dodgeball Club of the Year 2025, and that wider award adds weight to a runner-up spot in a national-finals setting. The two clubs now stand out as examples of what a strong junior pipeline looks like, one built on regular coaching, age-group continuity and exposure to proper championship pressure.

The finals context also matters. British Dodgeball listed the Under-13s event for 04/07/2026 at Arena Sport Kettering, placing it inside the British Champs 2026 schedule rather than treating it as a stand-alone youth tournament. That kind of staging gives younger players a genuine championship environment early, with the noise, format and stakes of a national event instead of a one-off local fixture.

For British dodgeball, that is the point. The federation’s junior framework is not just about awarding trophies at under-13 level; it is about building a repeatable route from school and club entry points into the rest of the age-group system. Derby’s victory and SW Leics’s podium finish show that the clubs doing that work best are already shaping the next wave of British talent, one championship bracket at a time.