After a historic bankruptcy, the German water polo players are threatened with an early end at the swimming world championships in Hungary and their worst performance in 21 years.
The team of the new national coach Petar Porobic lost in the first round match of group B in Debrecen with 11:12 (2:5, 2:3, 2:3, 5:1) against Japan. It was the first defeat in the twelfth duel with the Asians.
The playoffs for the quarterfinals are almost out of reach. The much younger team, which had originally missed out on qualifying for the World Cup, had moved up due to the exclusion of the Russian athletes.
The selection of the German Swimming Association (DSV), which is going through a personnel change under the successor of the long-standing national coach Hagen Stamm, got off to a weak start and was quickly 1:5 behind. In the last quarter, however, she fought her way back to 11:12 with 23 seconds to go.
The Montenegrin Porobic had nominated nine debutants because many top performers Julian Real, Dennis Eidner or Tobias Preuss had resigned. In addition, Berlin’s Marko Stamm and Mateo Cuk are injured. There are only four players left of the team that reached the World Cup quarter-finals under Stamm three years ago.
Victories against Croatia and Greece are considered utopian
Victories against the other opponents are utopian: On Thursday (6:00 p.m.) the DSV selection will meet two-time world champion Croatia, on Saturday (7:30 p.m.) against Olympic silver medalist Greece. The worst World Cup result so far was 14th place in 2001.
“The situation has never been so serious,” said Stamm, who was national coach from 2000 to 2012 and again under gentle pressure from 2016 to 2021, before the World Cup to “SID”: “There are no young people who are crowding out the old . We have failed to train internationals to fill the gap.”
After his final retirement after failing to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics, the 62-year-old recommended Porobic as his successor: “He’s very experienced, very successful, well connected and has worked with a lot of young people. He’s the best thing can currently happen to us in Germany.”