Away win in Balingen – TBV Lemgo celebrated an important success in the fight to stay in the league at the end of the 12th matchday of the Handball Bundesliga.
Newly promoted HBW Balingen-Weilstetten missed out on a much-needed home win in the handball Bundesliga. The bottom of the table lost to TBV Lemgo-Lippe on Monday evening after a strong start 26:30 (16:14) and remains bottom with 5:19 points. If they won, Balingen would have drawn level with three other teams on points, including Lemgo. The East Westphalia team (9:15) climbed to 13th place thanks to their second success in a row.
It didn’t look like Balingen’s seventh defeat in a row for a long time, the Swabians still led 21:19 in the second half. However, the guests, trained by 2007 world champion Florian Kehrmann, managed to turn things around with a 10-3 run within ten minutes. Jan Brosch stood out with nine goals at Lemgo, while Tobias Heinzelmann scored six goals at Balingen.
Kiel wins at Rhein-Neckar Löwen
The sportingly ailing handball champion THW Kiel preserved its mini-chance of successfully defending its title on Sunday (November 12th, 2023) with a 31:25 (14:9) win over cup winners Rhein-Neckar Löwen.
“We are going through a difficult phase, so every sense of success is important”said Kiel’s backcourt player Nikola Bilyk on the “Dyn” microphone after the catch-up game on the third match day. However, the gap to leaders Füchse Berlin (21:1) and pursuers SC Magdeburg (19:3) remains large. The capital club will be playing in Kiel next Sunday.
Internal debate
After the fifth defeat of the season last Thursday in Hanover, the Kiel team spoke out at an internal team meeting without coach Filip Jicha. “We are all good friends, but sometimes it takes a bang to get out of a crisis. We found open and honest words”reported circle runner Patrick Wiencek before kick-off.
Lots of mistakes on both sides
In Mannheim the fighting attitude was right from the start. After a wild start with a number of mistakes on both sides, the guests stabilized in the middle of the first half and took a five-goal lead for the first time at 12:7, which lasted until the break.
After the change, the Lions came within two goals, but were unable to turn the game around due to their high error rate. The best thrower for the winner was Magnus Landin with seven goals. Director Juri Knorr was also successful seven times for the home team, where national goalkeeper David Späth stood out with 18 saves.
Melsungen suffers third defeat
Meanwhile, MT Melsungen, which had started the season so successfully, suffered its third defeat of the current season on matchday 12. At VfL Gummersbach, coach Roberto Parrondo’s team clearly lost 31:37 (19:20). Melsungen remains third in the table, Gummersbach improved to sixth place.
National player Julian Köster and Georgian Giorgi Tschovrebadze were the best Gummersbach throwers with seven goals each. Director Elvar Örn Jonsson’s nine goals didn’t save Melsungen either.