The German basketball players around Satou and Nyara Sabally as well as Marie Gülich and Svenja Brunckhorst (from right) celebrated their first successful Olympic qualification in February.
Photo: dpa/Marx Vasconcelos
The elimination came in the quarter-finals against Egypt. When the German handball players also remained medalless at the 2021 Olympic Games, the story was complete: German team sports had failed and thus became the epitome of the increasingly poor performance of local athletes at the Olympics. Many teams didn’t even qualify, the footballers were eliminated in the preliminary round, and in the end the hockey players who started with title ambitions also missed out on bronze. The historic bankruptcy was sealed.
But were Germans really no longer worth anything in ball sports? The opposite seems to be true almost three years later in the next Olympic cycle. Medals have not yet been awarded, but German teams are noticeably on the rise: last Sunday the handball players qualified for Paris. Things can get even better for the German Handball Association if the DHB women also buy their tickets in Ulm in mid-April for the first time since 2008. The opponents from Montenegro, Slovenia and Paraguay are definitely beatable in the fight for the last two Olympic places. »It’s great that the men made it. Of course we want to follow suit now,” says cyclist Julia Behnke. She has never been so close to her dream, and that is not because of the opponents, but because of the noticeable development in the German team.
But how was this achieved? »It was a process that took time. “The core of the team has been together for many years now,” says Behnke to “nd”. Above all, many players dared to leave the Bundesliga and go abroad. Behnke himself was active for clubs in Russia and Hungary for three years. »There you always play and train at the highest level and quickly have the chance to develop further. You need the experience every day of the week, not just in a few international matches a year,” said Behnke. National coach Markus Gaugisch also sees this as the most important success factor: “Our players were able to play in the final of the Champions League with their clubs or win the title in the European League. Little by little they have grown with their tasks and learned to deal with pressure situations better.«
A well-rehearsed team and international experience are two factors that have also proven themselves in basketball. Here the successes are even more visible. The men in particular advanced to the absolute top of the world with bronze at the European Championships in 2022 and the first World Cup title in the history of the German Basketball Association (DBB) a year later. The national team built on the squad that made it to the quarter-finals in Tokyo in 2021. It was improved with other players who compete daily in the NBA with the superstars of the scene: The Wagner brothers Franz and Moritz, captain Dennis Schröder and center Daniel Theis have taken German basketball to new heights.
Those who didn’t make the jump to the NBA, like Niels Giffey or Johannes Voigtmann, went to Lithuania and Russia to get new impulses. At the same time, the Bundesliga sought foreign input. Above all, Alba Berlin imported Spanish coaches and sports directors. Other clubs followed suit. »With the Spaniards a new momentum has come in. Spain has been at the top of the world rankings for decades. “That has made a huge difference in Germany,” says DBB Vice President Armin Andres, who is responsible for competitive sports, in the nd interview.
The coaches of the German national teams, Lisa Thomaidis and Gordon Herbert, both come from Canada, the handball head coach comes from Iceland, the hockey players were led by a Belgian for a long time, and the volleyball players were led by Italians, Poles and Belgians. Only the German Football Association has never hired foreign coaches to date. Ironically, the footballers didn’t make it to the Olympics this time. These don’t have to be directly related. It is well known that the DFB has a coaching problem right down to the grassroots sports sector: base coaches did not receive an increase in their salaries for two decades. Young talented trainers are not invited to further training because they have never been a professional, have studied sport or cannot afford the five-figure training costs. The fact that the DFB produces comparatively few talents and only women have just managed to get their ticket to France can definitely be attributed to the association’s weaknesses in youth development.
The DFB relies heavily on the professional clubs in this area. Other associations take a different approach, especially for women. “Two years ago we decided to support young girls through the association,” reports DBB official Andres. The women’s basketball league is not yet strong enough to do this itself, so “we have intensified courses in the association. We are also looking for conversations with parents and have set up a special program for top talents. We send athletic and individual trainers all over Germany to train them even better. The DHB does a very similar thing.
Today’s national basketball players such as the Sabally sisters Satou and Nyara, Leonie Fiebich and Luisa Geiselsöder have completed the association’s program from the U16 to the senior national team, says Andres: “There is a continuity that is very important for the feeling of togetherness .« The reward: the first Olympic qualification a few weeks ago in Brazil.
The footballers aren’t the only ones who won’t be going to Paris. No German teams qualified in water polo or rugby either. Here, however, this was expected given the years of deficits. The demands are higher in football, even if the Olympics for men are not as important as the home European Championships a month earlier.
For other sports, however, the games are almost essential for survival, as state funding depends heavily on participation and performance at the Olympics, which is why the jubilation over the surprising victory in the decisive volleyball tournament in autumn 2023 was even greater. After 14 years without an indoor team at the Olympics, the cash-strapped German Volleyball Association (DVV) could use more support. With a strong Nations League in early summer, the women could even secure their first ticket since 2004.
But DVV sports director Christian Dünes doesn’t fall into euphoria: “There are quite a lot of people taking part in the Olympics this year. This shows that good work has been done in team sports.” But teams developed in waves. When one successful generation passes away, the next generation needs time to make it to the top. In 2019, the DVV nevertheless put together a concept to attract more young talent and support them better. “To be honest, you have to say that the success of men is not the fruit of this concept,” says Dünes when asked by nd. You only see that ten or 15 years later. »We have to work now to ensure that we are successful in 2032 and 2036. You then have to be measured against that.”
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