AUDIO: Filip Jicha stays: THW Kiel and his trainer extend their collaboration (1 min)
As of: October 23, 2025 10:00 a.m
Handball record champion THW Kiel and coach Filip Jicha are continuing their collaboration. As the club announced, the Czech has extended his contract, which expires in the summer of 2026, by two years until June 30, 2028.
“I have incredible fun working with this team. I have black and white in my heart and I’m passionate about the task of forming the new THW Kiel so that I can compete for the championship and the Champions League again in the future,” said Jicha. He is happy “that the current players – but also those who want and will join us – now have the clarity that we can go down this path together.”
Managing director Viktor Szilagyi praised his senior employee: “Filip works meticulously and passionately around the clock for our THW Kiel. He lives for this club and with this attitude and his qualities is exactly the right man we need.”
Jicha has been head coach at THW Kiel since 2019
Jicha, world handball player in 2010, also played for THW between 2007 and 2015 and won all major titles with the club. In 2015 he moved to FC Barcelona. After returning from Spain in 2018, he initially worked for a year as an assistant to the current national coach Alfred Gislason.
As a coach, the 43-year-old triumphed with Kiel in the Champions League in 2020, three times in the Bundesliga (2020, 2021 and 2023) and twice in the cup (2022 and 2025).
Closing the gap to Magdeburg and Berlin
Most recently, SC Magdeburg and Füchse Berlin have overtaken Kiel in Germany. This season, THW is in fourth place in the Bundesliga table after seven wins from nine games in the league.
The “Zebras” started the European League, the second highest European competition after the Champions League, with two confident victories.
