The handball players from the Faroe Islands celebrated as if they had just won the European Championship title. With a converted seven meter, the handball dwarf from the small island group in the North Atlantic sensationally defied the top favorites Norway to score 26:26 and celebrated the first European Championship point in their history at the last second. “It was an incredible game. We tried to stay cool the whole time and fight with everything we have. And in the end it paid off for us,” said Elias Ellefsen a Skipagotu. The Bundesliga professional from THW Kiel kept his nerve from the point and gave the starting signal for an exuberant party.
The Faroese offered the medal candidate a bitter fight for over 60 minutes. Norway only managed to pull away in the final phase. The game seemed decided when the Scandinavians led 26:23 with three minutes left. But the outsider fought back. There were eleven seconds left on the clock when a Skipagotu stole the ball from his THW colleague Harald Reinkind. The Faroese would have been free through, but Reinkind held on to him – seven meters. Goal. The hall shook.
The Mercedes-Benz Arena was already firmly in Faroese hands during the narrow opening defeat against Slovenia. In the duel with Norway on Saturday evening, thousands of supporters of the underdog once again turned the Berlin hall into a cauldron. Over 5,000 fans of the handball dwarf took part in the historic game – that’s around ten percent of the local population. Norway has around a hundred times the population.
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“Our fans are crazy. Without our unique fans, this would not have been possible today. We are incredibly grateful to them for their brilliant support over the last few days,” enthused Skipagotu, who celebrated with his teammates for minutes in front of the fan curve. The party continued on the bus to the hotel. It is the Faroe Islands’ first ever participation in the European Championship. After the surprise coup against the Scandinavians, progress is still possible. In the last game of Group D, third-placed teams will face bottom-placed Poland on Monday. The best two teams in each group qualify for the main round.
