After the draw in the duel with Austria, DHB star Juri Knorr was also very frustrated. His statements were reminiscent of one of the most famous frustration interviews.
The frustration among the German handball players was deep. After a disappointing 22:22 draw against Austria in the second game of the main round at the home European Championship, the DHB stars no longer have the semi-finals in their own hands.
The two remaining games against Hungary and Croatia must be won and Austria must lose points against France or Iceland so that the Germans can still reach second place in main round group I and thus the semi-finals.
Knorr is seething inside
The main reason for this on Saturday evening was the weak German offensive, which created numerous great chances but miserably missed them. Playmaker Juri Knorr was correspondingly disappointed after the game. How much the 23-year-old was boiling became clear when he responded somewhat angrily to some questions.
“I don’t know what you want. I think you want us to be successful, right? That we create another winter fairy tale for people, just create beautiful moments for everyone who is out there,” Knorr asked the media group . “If we all have the same goal, then we should work for it as long as we can,” he said.
“We tear ourselves apart on the record”
He also defended the German game: “I don’t know what is always expected. We are tearing ourselves apart on the board,” said Knorr, the best DHB thrower in every game so far. Against Austria, Germany “failed because of our free chances. That doesn’t mean that we played bad handball today.”
With the appearance, Knorr brought back memories of the former national soccer player Per Mertesacker, who gave a famous angry interview at the 2014 World Cup. After a weak game and a narrow win in extra time against Algeria in the round of 16, he got his frustration off his chest in an interview with ZDF following critical questions about the German performance.
Statements like “What do you want from me now?”, “Do you think there’s a carnival troupe in the last 16?” or “I’m going to lie down in the ice barrel for three days” are still burned into the collective football memory to this day.
The footballers improved significantly after the round of 16 and ended up winning their fourth World Cup title. It remains to be seen whether the handball players around Knorr will achieve something similar.