He was one of the best playmakers in world handball. The Swiss legend Andy Schmid has now been the coach of the nation for nine months, which will face Germany at the World Cup on Friday evening (8.30 p.m. on ZDF and in the full audio report on sportschau.de). Before the duel, Schmid speaks surprisingly openly about the things that make him unhappy.
The 1.90 meter man is now 41 years old, but when he enters the room in his tracksuit, he still looks like a player. Wiry, well-trained, apparently not a gram of fat too much. He also feels like a player, which is clear from many of his statements. And sometimes he would like to be one too.
“I would have liked to have had the ball in my own hands”
For example, on Wednesday between 6 and 7:30 p.m., shortly before the Germans celebrated their World Cup opener against Poland. The Swiss also made their tournament debut, and they did so with two completely different faces: outstanding in defense, at times subpar in the forward game.
At halftime it was 8:7 against the Czech Republic, and Germany achieved this interim result after just 15 minutes. In the end it was 17:17, so it was an extremely low-scoring game. Smith: “Sure, there were many moments where I would have liked to have had the ball in my own hands and made decisions.”
Many things don’t go fast enough for Schmid
This “powerlessness”, as Schmid says in the Sportschau podcast “Handball auf die 1”, is “the most difficult thing about the whole thing. The process of becoming a player is what bothers me the most. The fact that you can no longer do certain things in your own way hands.”
Exactly twelve months ago he still had the ball in his hands regularly, played in his home country for HC Kriens-Kuzern and even for the national team. After the European Championships in Germany, the exceptional talent ended his career. “I still often miss this feeling because now as a national coach, a lot of things just don’t happen fast enough for me,” said Schmid. “I just have this impatience in me that always drives me and that I can’t – and don’t want to – get rid of. It’s just part of me, I also see it as my strength.”
But this impatience, this lack of calm, they also affect his quality of life. When asked whether he is really happy with his current job, Schmid becomes thoughtful. “Happy? So privately everything is fine, I have a great wife and my children are healthy. But as a national coach I’m not completely happy, I’ll say that quite honestly. You don’t actually have any time, you can do it in the few phases with the team “I sometimes see myself as more of a manager and I miss that feeling of just being in the hall every day.”
Is he in the wrong job? Surprised faces in the press room, after all, Schmid has just signed a contract until after the 2028 European Championship. “Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t want to open the door that I would rather be a club coach”Schmid quickly pushed after him. “It’s of course good to be out of this hamster wheel sometimes. I also want to use this to look beyond handball and learn from other sports – there was never time for that before.”
Game makers with a feeling for spaces
Time is a big topic for Schmid. In two decades as a professional, he has rarely been able to shut down, very often big things have been expected of him, and he has delivered and delivered in fast motion. 1,094 goals in 218 games for Switzerland. 1,675 goals in 400 games for the Rhein-Neckar Löwen, for whom he played for twelve years and was named player of the season in the strongest handball league in the world for five seasons in a row.
In total, he scored almost 4,000 times in his career, but his passes were often even more impressive than his finishes: he saw gaps where everything was actually tight, he had an incredible feeling for space, for someone like Schmid the word game is Makers were invented. At his side, a young talent matured into a seasoned national player and world-class handball player: Juri Knorr.
Between demands and possibilities
The 24-year-old – Knorr’s commitment seems realistic despite his knee injury – is now one of many tasks that coach Schmid faces on Friday. “Sometimes, when you play against such good opponents, you feel like you used to before an exam in which you have ten topics,” said the 41-year-old. “You don’t have enough time to learn all ten topics. Then you only learn seven and hope you don’t get to the other three.”
Perhaps the greatest handball player in his country is struggling to reconcile the demands of being a player with the opportunities as a national team coach. “We’re playing against a team that’s talking about the semi-finals and a medal. For me, they have the best defense in the world. We’re a long way from that.”explains Schmid. “We’ve been hit hard twice recently, and there were experts who wanted to see us on equal terms beforehand. That’s why we’re happy to take on the role of outsider this time.”
“I’m getting tired of playing against Germany”
Schmid openly admits: “I’m also getting tired of having to play against Germany so often. They’re just not us with their defensive strength and their physicality. I would have preferred a different opponent.” The idea of tripping up Germany was for him “Far away. I’m okay with it if we lose narrowly but win against Poland and move into the main round.” The main thing is that his first tournament as a coach doesn’t end in the preliminary round – that wouldn’t suit Andy Schmid at all.