The German handball players’ playbook is nothing less than an attempt to decipher global women’s handball. It is a standard statistical work, encyclopedia and guide all in one. The national coach Markus Gaugisch says that this digital playbook is ultimately “an insane database”, not only with all of the German team’s rehearsed moves, but also with numbers, texts, drawings and video material about the German opponents among the 31 other nations that have played since Wednesday take part in the World Championships in Denmark, Norway and Sweden.
All the playful solutions are already there in the playbook, now the German women just have to put them on the table, as they say in handball. Their opening game in Herning, Denmark is this Thursday evening against Japan.
The 35-year-old left winger Antje Döll from German champions SSG Bietigheim is already quite familiar with solving puzzles from her second job. She works as a senior detective at the Ludwigsburg police headquarters and gets on the trail of internet blackmailers. The state of Baden-Württemberg’s sports funding enables her to have flexible working hours. “I’m super grateful for that,” she says and smiles. It doesn’t really stress her out; she actually likes the double burden: “It’s good for the head.”
“Our team is stronger than ever before,” says Chief Detective Antje Döll
The German handball players urgently need their heads at a world championship like this. They definitely have the playing quality to make it into the final tournament rounds of the world’s best teams, but in recent years their nerves towards the end of the tournaments have often prevented them from getting a better placement. The last medal for German handball women was in 2007 (World Cup bronze), the last semi-final participation in a major tournament was in 2008 (fourth place in the European Championships) and the last Olympic participation in Beijing in the same year. The German team always came seventh in the last three major tournaments and was only moderately satisfied with that.
Open detailed view
National coach Markus Gaugisch (center) gathers his team for final discussions before the World Cup.
(Photo: Kolektiff Images/dpa)
If it’s true that you learn the most from defeats and disappointments, then the German handball players would be ready to perhaps make it to a semi-final again. “I think the experiences of the past few years will help us,” says one captain, Alina Grijseels. “We now have more quality and variability in the squad,” says the other captain Emily Bölk, who plays in Budapest and even reached the Champions League final with the Ferencvaros club last June. Most German national players are gaining increasing experience at high and international levels, which leads Commissioner Döll to conclude: “Our team is stronger than ever.”
The fact that with Luisa Schulze (Kristiansand/Denmark), Julia Maidhof, Isabell Roch (both Ramnicu Valcea/Romania), Silje Bröns Petersen (Copenhagen/Denmark) and Ann-Cathrin Giegerich (Podgorica/Montenegro) there are not five German legionnaires at top international clubs Made it into Gaugisch’s 17 World Cup squad could be interpreted as a fundamental quality feature.
The minimum goal is the quarter-finals and thus participation in an Olympic qualifying tournament
The players’ realistic goal is not necessarily the semi-finals or a medal – the absolute minimum goal is the quarter-finals, because reaching this means qualifying for an Olympic qualifying tournament next April. They are all really dreaming of Paris next summer. “We want to go to the Olympics,” says captain Alina Grijseels, both succinctly and programmatically. The national coach Gaugisch may have noticed in this context: “The players are bursting with energy.”
At the Olympics, and German handball players have not enjoyed this advantage for 15 years, sports that receive less media attention are also broadcast live on public television. This is also a ray of hope for the handball players because the World Cup in Scandinavia, like the European Championships a year ago, is only broadcast on the Internet, on sportdeutschland.tv and not even free of charge. “Of course we would prefer to be seen on free TV,” says Grijseels, but they would have to put a certain amount of pressure on the TV stations through their services. DHB President Andreas Michelmann meanwhile criticized the “very one-sided reporting from ARD and ZDF”, which focuses primarily on football.
And so this time the German handball players’ ‘playbook’ is useful for three big goals: for the fight for the top spot in the world, for the Olympics and for future appearances on free-to-air television.
