MT Melsungen also wins its last game in 2024. Now statistics and experts are even talking about the championship title. The upcoming World Cup even benefits the team.
The MT Melsungen winters in first place in the handball Bundesligaonly has four negative points on the account. Here are four important factors for the second half of the season. Three speak for a great success from Melsung.
The statistics
The journalist Rasmus Boysen compiled interesting statistics after the MT autumn championship title: Six of the last ten of those title holders also became champions. Since 1977, 31 of 47 fall champions have made it to champions. During this period, only six Herbmeisters did not end up first or second, all of them made it into the top four in the final rankings.
The current statistics also speak for themselves: Melsungen conceded the fewest goals (per game) of all teams. What’s interesting is that the team also had to swallow the fewest goals against fast counterattacks. And at home the MT didn’t have to give up a single point.
The World Cup
The league will pause in January due to the Handball World Cup. Melsungen’s leading players such as Nebojsa Simic, Erik Balenciaga and Dainis Kristopans are not taking part in the tournament. Only right winger Timo Kastening is in the (provisional) squad for the German national team. Ian Barrufet was nominated for Spain, Adrian Sipos for Hungary, Elvar Örn Jonsson and Arnar Freyr Arnasson for Iceland. In the competition, however, the teams have to leave almost all top performers behind. Accordingly, the MT can possibly prepare better for the second half of the season. This starts on February 8th with the game against Göppingen. Then come the tough opponents Kiel (European Cup) and Magdeburg (League).
The program
A disadvantage in the second half of the season could be the game plan: In the first half of the season, Melsungen hosted top teams such as Flensburg, Berlin, Magdeburg and Hannover at home – and won all the games. Roberto Garcia Parrondo’s team only had to go to THW Kiel away. In the return series there are four difficult games on foreign territory, and in absolute cauldrons at that. In addition to the Final Four in Cologne, the Hessians also have the additional burden of the European Cup. With the exception of Mohamed Darmoul’s serious injury, the Melsung team have so far been largely spared from long-term absences. For the big highlight, it would have to stay that way.
The expert opinion
At the beginning of December, Stefan Kretzschmar decided that Melsungen would be the first to overwinter. Now he said in the Dyn podcast that he was betting on Magdeburg as the next champion. However, world champion Pascal Hens expressed himself in the same format as follows: “They already have a small cushion. Melsungen is more stable than Hanover. The actual favorites as pursuers also take points away from each other. If the Melsungers manage it, even just one of them If you win away games against the big guys and do your thing otherwise, then in the end they will become German champions.”
