Successful dress rehearsal as encouragement: With a strong performance in the last European Championship test against Olympic champion France, Germany’s handball players have gained a lot of self-confidence. The young DHB selection prevailed on Sunday evening in Wetzlar with a goal in the last second from Luca Witzke with 35:34 (14:18) and raised hopes for a successful final in Hungary and Slovakia.
The best thrower in the convincing team of national coach Alfred Gislason was backcourt player Kai Häfner with eight goals. On Wednesday, the DHB selection flies to Bratislava, where Belarus, Austria and Poland are the opponents in the preliminary round.
The German team started courageously, but had little access to the nimble French in defense in the first half. The DHB team was behind from the start, scoring three goals for the first time at 6: 9 (14th). The Gislason protégés were initially unimpressed. With a 3-0 run, they equalized for the first time within six minutes. In this phase, almost everything in the German game fit, which subsequently remained too prone to errors. Especially on the defensive, the young German team was shown some limits by the seven-time world champion – especially since goalkeeper Till Klimpke was not a factor and mostly could not save anything.
Playmaker Philipp Weber has to leave the field with a shoulder injury
At 10:14 (24th), the DHB selection was behind by four goals. To make matters worse, playmaker Philipp Weber from Bundesliga leaders SC Magdeburg had to go off the floor after an unfortunate collision with a shoulder injury. “We had a few phases in which we were equal. The biggest difference is in the speed game,” summed up DHB sports director Axel Kromer at halftime.
In order to stabilize the cover, Gislason sent Andreas Wolff into the goal shortly before the break. The 30-year-old from the Polish top club Vive Kielce, who had already shown a strong performance last Friday at 30:26 against Switzerland, was again the hoped-for support after a short start-up phase. Overall, there was now a jolt through the German team. The defense was more courageous and in the attack, the Melsung backcourt axis Kai Häfner and Julius Kühn (5 goals) turned up.
At 22:23 (40th) the connection was made. Five minutes later, the fifth in the European Championship of 2020 took the lead for the first time at 27:26. In the exciting final phase, the German team kept their nerve and celebrated a well-deserved success.
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