At a press conference, national coach Alfred Gislason provided a strange moment. He addressed his own player with the wrong name.
Handball coach Alfred Gislason has been in business for several years. For 34 years now, the Icelander has stood for various clubs and countries on the sidelines and celebrated numerous successes. Among others with SC Magdeburg and THW Kiel, the 65-year-old won the championship in the German Handball Bundesliga several times and the Champions League three times. He has been looking after the DHB team since 2020.
In the course of his coaching career, Gislason worked with many and coached against even more players – even over several generations. This is exactly what Gislason was doing something at a press conference as part of the World Cup in Herning in Danish.
On Friday, Gislason sat on the podium together with national player Nils Lichtlein, who had shown an appealing performance the evening before in the 34:27 main victory against Italy. When asked about the qualities of Lichtlein, Gislason put on his answer with the wrong first name. “The Carsten,” said the national coach, before noticing his mistake and remembering the right first name Nils on Lichtlein.
The background to the confusion: Nils Lichtin is the nephew of the former handball professional Carsten Lichtlein, who became world champion in 2007, among others. In the “old hands” of Gislason, the name Lichtlein still seems to be connected to the 44-year-old ex-goalkeeper.
For Nils Lichtlein, however, there was little reason to be annoyed, because after the short mistake in his first name, Gislason followed a lot of praise. Lights played very well against Italy. “He is a very agile player, he took advantage of his chances very well and got his teammates in motion extremely well,” enthused the national coach. “He was instrumental in the fact that we played much better,” said Gislason, and Lichtlein then gave two strong shoulder tapsters with a wide grin.
However, this seemed to be almost a bit uncomfortable with the excessive praise of the national coach. Although he also received the shoulder tapper with a laugh, his face was colored red.
In any case, Lichtlein’s role should continue to grow in the coming days. The sick Juri Knorr, who already missed the Italy, will not yet be operational at the last main round game against Tunisia and is currently even questionable for the quarter-finals next Wednesday. Accordingly, Gislason should send his substitute Lichtlein onto the plate – and then also address him with the right name.