Dhe exhilaration was quickly gone. Even before the preparations for the new season in the Handball Bundesliga had begun, Bennet Wiegert had a thousand things going through his head. From hunter to hunted? How to pass in five competitions? What is the distribution of roles in goal?
Wiegert is not the type to sit back anyway – his job description as coach and head of sport at SC Magdeburg simply does not provide for that. But the 40-year-old coach himself seems surprised or frightened at how quickly the enjoyment of the first championship title since 2001 disappeared. How quickly everyday life, work, tasks caught up with him: when the SCM was in the middle of preparing for the 2022/23 series at the beginning of August, the triumphal procession through the state capital of Saxony-Anhalt at the beginning of June was already far, far away.
The SCM wants to be champion again
That’s Wiegert. The title gives him the responsibility to meet expectations – not least his own. So: become German champions again. This is how the Magdeburg team formulated their goal for the season, which is courageous, because the competition from Kiel, Flensburg and Berlin is more defensive about their plans.
The energy with which the SCM wants to survive in the concert of the big ones could be seen on Wednesday evening at the season overture in Düsseldorf: Wiegert’s team was defeated by the cup winner THW Kiel 33:36 in the Supercup and missed the first trophy of the season, but how the champion bit into the game after a weak start and sniffed at victory for a long time, reminded of the feats of the previous season.
Landin hard to beat
However, the fact that his team has now lost three times in a row against their unloved northern rivals rankles Wiegert: “We missed far too many free throws against Niklas Landin.” The famous Dane made 19 saves – once again Kiel won a big game because of him. The SCM now has to wait until mid-November before the next summit meeting with the THW is due.
Something happened in Magdeburg last season that caused a strong boost in self-confidence. If the SCM with its nine million euro budget was already a championship candidate in the years before, but always hid behind its own ambition, the traditional club from the East is now brave enough to formulate the highest goals: “We are German Became a champion,” says Wiegert, “why shouldn’t we be that again?”
In fact, in the seven years under Wiegert, the SCM has crawled to the top of the table, was fifth, fourth, then third three times. When everything went right in the pre-season, his team struck.
The Final Four as a goal
The team got off to a fantastic start. Wiegert’s team wants to copy him, starting with the games on Sunday and Thursday against newly promoted Hamm and Gummersbach. And then the Champions League campaign begins with top-class players like Paris and Veszprem, who the whole region is looking forward to. Here, too, courageous announcements come from the team; One would like to reach the Final Four in June 2023 in Cologne, says captain Christian O’Sullivan.
The strain will be enormous, as the SCM is still playing at the Super Globe, the club world championship, in Saudi Arabia at the end of October – as the defending champion. Wiegert and managing director Marc-Henrik Schmedt have not increased the squad for this. The SCM wants to get through the season with 17 men.
The change in the group has remained manageable. Goalkeeper Jannick Green, who went to Paris, was replaced by Switzerland’s Nikola Portner. Lucas Meister replaces Norwegian Magnus Gullerud at the circle. Green and Gullerud were leaders both internally and externally. However, the SCM tries to tick off the departures under “business as usual”.
Wiegert pulls through his style
A lot will depend on whether the exhausting style that Wiegert plays works again. He asks his first back row, consisting of Philipp Weber, Omar Ingi Magnusson and Gisli Kristjansson, to play their way up to six meters in front of the goal and throw from there.
The SCM doesn’t have long backcourt shooters, doesn’t want Wiegert – he pulls through his style of handball. The fast, bustling Magdeburg handball, which relies on one-on-one situations, could be particularly successful against the mostly huge defenders in the Champions League.
The courage of the SCM is already gratifying. Small rolls are no longer baked here. Appearance and statements are of the stamp of a master. That’s good for the whole league. And maybe Bennet Wiegert could enjoy defending his title a little more in the summer of 2023.
