The German handball players have to play an all-or-nothing game for the Olympic ticket. The team missed a match point against Croatia, especially in a desolate first half. There’s a lot to criticize, but the atmosphere isn’t one of them this time.
Bratwurst? Of course, you can buy them at the snack bars in the ZAG Arena in Hanover. It costs five euros and comes with rolls. Many a fan enjoyed it with a cola or a beer before the game between Germany and Croatia in the handball Olympic qualification. But during the game the spectators definitely had their hands free. For clapping and drumming. There was no sign of the “bratwurst” atmosphere in the stands denounced by national coach Alfred Gislason during the game. “Fifteen minutes before the end I thought they were all with bratwurst on their side,” he said during the easy 41:29 opening win against Algeria. And hoped for “more”.
He should get more, and the hall spokesman had given his all in advance. He urged the 10,099 spectators to be fully active. He made announcements about how to react and when and repeatedly encouraged Germany-Germany chants. The arena loudspeakers were turned up to the point of almost bursting the eardrums, and the announcement that the fans should stand up to replace the missing player during two-minute time penalties was exceeded. The fans stood almost the entire time. By itself, without being asked to do so. “The support was there from start to finish. The viewers noticed that we needed them,” says Rune Dahmke.
While there was more for Gislason from the fans, there was less from his players. Significantly less. At the end it is 30:33, a result that looks even better than it seems for a long time. This was preceded by a desolate performance in the first half. Only after 5:52 minutes did the first German goal come, Juri Knorr scored it. But then it’s just 1:4. And it continues like this, another four minutes later there is the second goal to make it 2:5. Complete disillusionment early on.
Croatia’s goalkeeper Dominik Kuzmanovic holds up outstandingly and always has his hands on it, even with several seven-meter shots. In addition, the Germans keep throwing balls away unnecessarily – they had already criticized the exploitation of their chances against Algeria. Füchse sports director Stefan Kretzschmar had predicted a “brutally difficult” game; the encounter had already ended in favor of the Croatians at the home European Championship. Under different circumstances, Germany had already secured the main round ticket, so Gislason didn’t want to give anything away in advance.
Well-known problems in attack
The fact that Dagur Sigurdsson, the former DHB coaching hero who first became European champion with the “Bad Boys” in 2016 and then also won Olympic bronze, is now a newly crowned Croatian coach, was not something his compatriot in German dress wanted to rate too highly. After all, Sigurdsson has only been in office for a few days; the party against Austria (35:29) was his first.
Dahmke was more cautious: “He knows us all very well and I know that he watched a lot of the Bundesliga during his time in Japan,” said one of three in the DHB team who celebrated the successes with Sigurdsson. The defeat is not primarily due to the supposed advantage in knowledge. The Germans made life too difficult for themselves. “Our problem was clearly free chances and technical errors,” said captain Johannes Golla after the game. “The problem has been with us for a long time. It was the same problem against Austria at the European Championships with the free throws,” he says, looking back at the home European Championship in January, where Austria wrested a draw from the DHB team in the preliminary round. And he says with foresight, because Austria is the team that now stands decisively between Germany and the Olympic Games.
Everything is set for a showdown with the neighbors (2:10 p.m./ARD and Dyn). Only the two best teams from the group of four secure a ticket to the Summer Games in France. The conditions couldn’t be more exciting: Germany and Austria have exactly the same goal difference. But Germany scored a single more goal, which puts them just that tiny bit ahead. If the neighborhood duel ends in a draw, the DHB team will be at the Olympic Games. Playmaker Knorr emphasized even before this constellation became known: “We have a final, that’s nice.”
“Croatia deserved to win,” says Gislason. “We made serious mistakes.” After all, he and his team agree: the second half is encouraging. The German attacking game is becoming faster and more targeted, Kuzmanovic no longer has a decisive influence on the game – and so the DHB team fights its way to two goals. There is real hope once again, but there is still a lack of effectiveness. And so it never really gets ticklish.
Captain struggles with “very, very bad feeling”
“If there’s something positive that can be taken from this defeat, it’s that we were forced to use the whole squad,” said Gislason, and didn’t necessarily do so voluntarily. Knorr is visibly struggling with himself, gets long timeouts, Heymann is sent off with a red card after a foul on Croatia’s leader Domagoj Duvnjak and has to be replaced. As in the win against Algeria, the bright ray of hope is Renars Uscins, the Hanoverian is once again voted player of the game by his home audience. Goalkeeper Andreas Wolff also shows a decent performance, but is also unlucky because second throws go in or the people in front of him don’t do anything with his save on the counterattack.
So now the all-or-nothing game against Austria. “The players regained some self-confidence in the second half,” said the coach. He will also have his personal final against Austria; after all, his contract as national coach will only be extended until the home World Cup in 2027 if he succeeds in qualifying for the Olympics.
The second half builds up, the players see it that way independently of each other. With one exception: Captain Johannes Golla speaks of a “very, very bad feeling” with which they drive home. There will likely be a lot of conversation to be had in the team hotel in the evening, he says. “Then we’ll deal with it as a team, we’re such a good unit that we can have conversations. Everyone can say where the problem is.” And then? “Then we’ll get up tomorrow with a better feeling and start the game well.” He and his team want to treat us to the present for Julian Köster’s 24th birthday.