Live ticker: After turbulent days, the DHB selection meets Spain at the European Handball Championship

Created: 01/20/2022, 10:50 am

By: Stefan Krieger

After beating Poland, the DHB selection had every reason to celebrate at the 2022 European Handball Championship.

© Marco Wolf/imago

Nine Corona failures, five nominees - and only one goalkeeper.

Despite everything, the DHB selection has reached the main round at the European Handball Championship and meets Spain there.

• The DHB team has to fight numerous corona failures* at the European Handball Championship 2022* in Hungary and Slovakia.

• In the main round, the team around national coach Alfred Gislason is now up against Spain, Norway, Sweden and Russia.

• The first win against the reigning European champions Spain is scheduled for Thursday (January 20th, 2022).

Germany - Spain -:-, game starts on Thursday, January 20th, 2022, 6 p.m

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Update from January 20th, 2022, 8.40 a.m .:

After further Corona failures, Germany’s handball players are weakened in terms of personnel in the first EM main round game against Spain.

For the duel with the defending champion this Thursday (6 p.m. / ARD), national coach Alfred Gislason has at least 16 players available because, according to dpa information, the DHB has again nominated players for the tournament in Slovakia and Hungary.

Live ticker: After turbulent days, the DHB selection meets Spain at the European Handball Championship

Bratislava – There are turbulent days behind the DHB selection. Although the team around national coach Alfred Gislason was able to celebrate entering the main round on Sunday (January 16, 2022), the bad news spread quickly afterwards. Backcourt player Julius Kühn tested positive for Corona at the weekend, the player Hendrik Wagner nominated for him was also positive and therefore could not help the team.

But that's not all.

On Monday (01/17/2022) five other players of the DHB team were then infected, on Tuesday (01/18/2022) two more corona cases were added.

As a result, a total of nine players were absent at short notice.

Coach Gislason nominated five players, including goalkeeper Johannes Bitter.

If he hadn't been able to play against Poland on Tuesday, the German team would not have had a goalkeeper, because both Andreas Wolff and Till Klimpke are in isolation due to a corona infection.

DHB selection meets Spain in the main round of the handball championship

But it went well, Bitter was able to play and immediately showed a good performance against Poland.

Overall, the DHB team seemed in better shape, the defense delivered for the first time in this tournament, with Julian Köster and Christoph Steinert in particular providing the necessary goals.

In the end, the result was clear with 30:23* and the team secured first place in the group.

In the main round, Spain, Norway, Sweden and Russia are now waiting for the DHB selection.

Anything but easy tasks, but the team had already described themselves as "lucky bags" before the tournament - and they live up to this description.

DHB selection with difficulties in the preliminary round of the European Handball Championship

Nevertheless: The team had a really difficult time against Belarus and Austria at times, the defense allowed too many goals from the opponents.

If the team can repeat their performance from the game against Poland in the main round, they could keep a small chance of progressing.

The first game of the main round on Thursday (January 20th, 2022) will be against the reigning European champions Spain.

The Spanish team starts with six tournament debutants in the European Handball Championship, but the big goal for the team around national coach Jordi Ribera is again: defending the title.

After the surprising victory of the German team in 2016, no team came past Spain in 2018 and 2020, so they should be the strongest opponent of the DHB selection in the main round.

(skr)