Handball German Domain
Three German handball teams fight for the European Cup victory
Status: 07:10 am | Reading time: 3 minutes
Füchse Berlin against Rhein-Neckar Löwen: This duel takes place in the semi-finals of the European League
Source: dpa/Uwe Anspach
In the past 20 years, only two winners of the European Handball League have come from outside Germany. There is a good chance that the champion will once again come from the Bundesliga: this weekend, three teams can continue this trend.
The European Handball League can safely be described as a German domain. In the past 20 years, only two non-Bundesliga clubs have managed to enter their names on the winners’ list of the second most important European cup. The Final Four will be played again in Hamburg this weekend, and defending champions Füchse Berlin, SG Flensburg-Handewitt and Rhein-Neckar Löwen want to expand their impressive record.
For each of the three Bundesliga teams, the days in Hamburg are the last opportunity to end the season with a title win. The second-placed team has already secured a place in the Champions League for the coming season, “but that’s not something you can really hold in your hands,” says Füchse coach Jaron Siewert. There is a lot of respect for the other three teams, but the Berliners want to take “the thing” back to Berlin. “That’s how we see ourselves as defending champions,” says the 30-year-old.
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The field of participants is completed by the Romanian champions Dinamo Bucharest, who will face Flensburg in the first semi-final on Saturday (3 p.m.). Afterwards (6 p.m.) the Berliners and the Löwen will determine the second finalist. The match for third place and the final will take place at the same times on Sunday. All games will be broadcast on the streaming services Dyn and DAZN.
Good omen for Flensburg, Lions with declaration of war
The third-placed team in the league from Flensburg has had good experiences with the Romanians. In the 2021/22 season, they met in the group phase of the Champions League. The SG won the home game 37:20, while the northern Germans celebrated a 28:20 victory in Bucharest. In final tournaments, however, things have not been going quite so well for Flensburg recently. At the Final Four of the DHB Cup in mid-April, the semi-final against MT Melsungen was lost 28:33. “We have to get into the game better and bring everything to the table from the start,” demanded team captain Johannes Golla.
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If you take the results from the Bundesliga, the Füchse are clear favorites against the Löwen, who have disappointed so far as they are eleventh in the table. The Berlin team won the games 38:32 and 36:28. However, the Mannheim team is showing a different face in the European League. They are the only team to have made it from the qualification round to the final round. “We haven’t had good months in the Bundesliga. But that doesn’t matter this weekend,” says right winger Patrick Groetzki, adding: “In a Final Four like this, anything is possible for any team.”
Berlin’s Gidsel breaks HBL goal record, Füchse in the Champions League – The highlights in the video
Mathias Gidsel scored seven goals for the Füchse Berlin in the match against TSV Hannover-Burgdorf. The Dane thus set a new goal record in the Handball Bundesliga. But there is even more reason for the Füchse to be happy. The highlights in the video.
All three Bundesliga clubs have won the European League or the EHF Cup as the predecessor competition at least once. Flensburg won in 1997, the Löwen in 2013. The Berliners won the title before 2023 in 2015 and 2018. Only Bucharest still has no international merits. The 20-time Romanian champions were last in the semi-finals of a European competition 20 years ago.
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The arena in Hamburg’s Volkspark is hosting the European League Final Four for the first time. Just over 8,000 tickets were sold on Friday for the hall, which has a maximum capacity of 12,000 spectators. The European Handball Federation (EHF) would like to play the final round entirely in the Hanseatic city. The model is the Champions League, which has held its final tournament in Cologne since 2010.
