After the clear defeat against Croatia, the German handball players are going into the semi-finals. The dominator of the past few years is waiting there.
In the end, an apology was due: After a disappointing 24:30 defeat by the German national handball team in the last main round game of the home European Championship, Juri Knorr went to the microphone and asked the audience in the Lanxess Arena, which was once again sold out with 19,750 spectators, for forgiveness.
Video | Usury of opportunities: The highlights of the game between Germany and Croatia
“To be honest, I’m sorry for everyone who was in the hall and bought tickets,” the playmaker called out to the fans: “That hurts us all extremely, that’s not the mentality we wanted to play with.” He immediately gave the reason for the team’s unusually lackluster performance: “We’re in the semi-finals, but maybe we thought about it too much beforehand and switched off in our heads.”
Knorr was alluding to the fact that Germany was already in the semi-finals before the start of the game after the defeats of Austria and Hungary. So it happened that for the first time ever a German national team lost a handball game in the Lanxess Arena. Instead of tailwind, the DHB team is now taking some question marks with them into the semi-finals – where a truly Herculean task awaits.
Old weaknesses plague the German game
In the game against Croatia there were well-known problems that caused the German team to stumble. As in the draw against Austria, national coach Alfred Gíslason’s team created many chances to score, but missed too many of them. The Germans only managed 44 percent of their throws into the goal and once again missed many free throws.
While the reason for this had raised questions against Austria, it seemed all too obvious for the game against Croatia: a win and therefore a full-throttle performance were no longer necessary to reach the semi-finals. Concentration waned. Christoph Steinert admitted after the game that it was a difficult situation to maneuver: “It was strange. You can’t not deal with it.”
Gíslason rotated happily
National coach Alfred Gíslason also freely revealed at the press conference after the game that he had taken advantage of the situation. He gave his regulars more breaks and relied on players who hadn’t yet gotten as much playing time. “I want to say that we would have played differently if we had to win it absolutely. I wouldn’t have rotated so much,” said Gíslason. Although he was dissatisfied with his team’s performance, if he had played with all the regulars and won, he would probably be “even more dissatisfied than I am now,” said Gíslason about his workload management.
The national coach would have liked to have avoided such a significant defeat – just like the players. Because Knorr wasn’t the only one who was frustrated after the game. “It feels really modest right now,” said veteran Kai Häfner. “I’m also a bit annoyed with our performance and how we presented ourselves here today.” They actually wanted to take a certain flow into the semi-finals. “Then you have a sold-out place here and we’re playing such a snotty game. That’s not good,” were Häfner’s clear words.
“The euphoria is gone”
Left winger Rune Dahmke said: “It’s annoying. You can tell the euphoria is a little down right now. We have achieved something that is the greatest thing for German handball in many years, and yet we don’t feel that way.”