Handball European Championship 2024: German handball players under great pressure at the home European Championship

One of the unwritten rules of team sports is that a coach does not destroy his protégés after disastrous performances, but rather protects his team. National coach Alfred Gislason did not stick to this iron rule on Saturday evening, even though his team had put in one of the worst performances in recent years. “The team has repeatedly dug itself in,” said the 64-year-old with a gloomy expression after the 22:22 draw against Austria, which meant a real setback for the German handball players at the home European Championship.

In order to achieve the self-imposed goal of participating in the semi-finals, the German team now needs help with three points – Austria (4) and France (6) are in the best position two match days before the end of the main round. But the national coach’s biggest problem is that the German offensive seems to lack any structure and is shockingly easy to defend. In any case, easy victories in the two remaining main round games against Hungary (Monday) and Croatia (Wednesday, 8:30 p.m.) are not to be expected in this form.

In the game analysis, the national coach particularly addressed the catastrophic exploitation of opportunities. In fact, the German shooters had repeatedly failed because of Austria’s goalkeeper Constantin Möstl, who played sensationally and ended up with 17 saved balls with a catch rate of 47 percent – Gislason reacted to this just as stunned as the 19,750 fans in the sold-out Cologne Arena.

The national coach’s plan to spare director Juri Knorr, who had a cold, failed in the 13th minute. Deputy Philipp Weber, who lacked any self-confidence, had by then produced two missed throws and two technical errors. Gislason ordered Knorr, the best German shooter and passer with 36 goals, back onto the field. Nevertheless, the German game still lacks the obvious processes that are required at this level. Austria’s aggressive defense, which focused on Knorr and the half-left winger standing at the plate, stopped almost all triggering actions, and the German backcourt players wore themselves out in duels instead of making free throws.

The great uncertainty in the DHB selection is also reflected in the fact that they hardly run any quick attacks, with which they actually wanted to hide their problems in the positional attack. Gislason’s promise to score easy goals had already failed spectacularly against Iceland when the statistics in the “Fast breaks” section showed zero.

Things didn’t go much better against Austria, although the German defense around middle blockers Johannes Golla and Julian Köster did a good job and goalkeeper Andreas Wolff, who had already saved his team against Iceland, once again performed at a world-class level (14 saves, rate: 39 percent). . Nevertheless, there were hardly any quick passes to the front. The uncertainty could be felt at all times.

The fact that the German selection still managed to make up for the 16:21 deficit in the dramatic final eleven minutes of the game and thus at least keep their tournament chances alive was also due to the opponent, who now collapsed physically and made more and more of their own mistakes in the game sprinkled in. “We can still be happy about the point,” said left-hander Kai Häfner, who is far from his top form. »This game feels very, very bad.«

The German handball players have not yet been able to achieve the goal of playing their way to the semi-finals together with the spectators. They often offer standing handball, which becomes easy prey for opponents. “That was incredibly bad of us and might ruin our goals,” said Captain Golla. Right winger Timo Kastening described his team as having had a “catastrophic performance” and an “underground game” for himself.

The team is now under enormous pressure against Hungary this Monday. One defeat and the chapter of Alfred Gislason, whose contract expires in the summer, will be history. The Icelander is not responsible for the pool of players, which is not internationally competitive, especially in the backcourt. But there are no signs of surprise or creative solutions that could be drawn from this individual inferiority. The host simply seems uninspired. The subtext in Gislason’s statements, according to which the tactics and strategy were right and only his team’s poor finishing was the problem, not only broke with the unwritten rules of team sports. He also fell short and glossed over the association’s structural problems.

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