Last test before the Handball World Cup: Desolate offensive performance: Handball players struggle to win

The German handball players congratulated themselves with relief after their hard-earned victory in the test match against Brazil. To the applause of the atmospheric Hamburg audience, the athletes said goodbye to their World Cup adventure. But question marks regarding a winter fairy tale remain after the 28:26 (13:17), because coach Alfred Gislason’s team was behind for a long time due to a sometimes catastrophic offensive performance.

The DHB team’s best thrower was Juri Knorr with five goals. The DHB team won the first duel on Thursday 32:25. “It was actually positive that – even if we didn’t play well at all – they showed a lot of character and fought their way into the game and played much better in the second half,” said Gislason on ZDF and criticized: “Normally “If you miss 20 balls or more, you almost never win.”

On Monday, the German selection travels to the team headquarters in Silkeborg, Denmark, before the World Cup opener against Poland on Wednesday. Other opponents in the preliminary round are Switzerland and the Czech Republic. The German handball players are the clear favorites in their group and want to win their first World Cup medal since the 2007 title.

Usury of opportunities despite the regular formation

Four days before the start of the World Cup, Gislason didn’t want to experiment too much and started in his regular formation around playmaker Juri Knorr, Renars Uscins and Andi Wolff. After the national goalkeeper took a break on Thursday shortly after the birth of his first child, he now played from the start – and was not at all satisfied with the performance of his front men. “It was a tough job today. We actually thought that the last game was enough of a warning that we have to do better today. I think the defensive performance throughout the game was better than in the last game. But that’s what we have “We made an incredible number of missed throws against the goalkeeper today and unfortunately lost a lot of the ball in our ranks,” analyzed captain Johannes Golla.

Despite all the experience on the field, the DHB team acted too imprecisely on offense in front of 12,379 spectators and missed one great chance after another. Bad passes and missed throws, including a missed seven-meter throw, characterized the initial phase. “That’s just too much. Concentrate,” demanded Gislason from the sidelines when the score was 6:8.

The German defense also couldn’t find its rhythm and sometimes let the Brazilians walk through the defense unchallenged. The substitution of DHB young stars Nils Lichtlein, Marko Grgic and Justus Fischer also had no effect.

Brazil’s goalkeeper continues to excel

The guests managed to keep the hall largely quiet even after the break. The comfortable three-goal lead remained. Also because the DHB team once again missed a bunch of opportunities. Golla, Köster and Luca Witzke, who were almost free-standing, were denied by Brazil’s keeper Rangel da Rosa and drove Gislason to despair on the sidelines.

The 65-year-old brought fresh energy again with a score of 19:22. It was substitute left winger Rune Dahmke who equalized to make it 23:23 around ten minutes before the end of the game and sent the sold-out arena into ecstasy. David Späth in goal kept his team in the game with impressive saves. Despite a catastrophic performance in attack, the DHB team turned the game around in the final phase.