Frankfurt / Main (dpa) – The German Handball Federation (DHB) created clarity one day before Christmas Eve and provided national coach Alfred Gislason with a contract until the summer of 2024.
The 62-year-old Icelander, whose working paper would have expired in February, will not only lead the national team at the upcoming European Championship (January 13-30, 2022 in Hungary and Slovakia), but also at the 2023 World Cup in Poland and Sweden as well as at the major events in 2024: the European Championship at home and the Olympic Games in Paris that followed in the summer.
“We have achieved a lot in the past few months. I am sure that the further development of the currently very young and still inexperienced team will give us a lot of pleasure,” said Gislason, who celebrates Christmas with his children and grandchildren in Iceland spends. Despite many major events, he asked for patience for the upcoming path. The prerequisite is “that we have time for this journey”.
Experienced trainer “as solid as a rock”
Gislason succeeded Christian Prokop at the beginning of 2020 and has faced a number of adversities since then. First of all, the corona crisis slowed professional sport for months. Ghost games and tournaments followed, in which the head coach had to replace numerous top performers. The historically poor performance at the World Cup in Egypt (twelfth place) in no way left the association in doubt about the new coach, as the long-term extension now shows.
“With all his experience, Alfred Gislason fits in very well with the rebuilding of our national team. This new and young formation will be able to use such an experienced coach as a rock solid”, said association president Andreas Michelmann. At the Olympic Games in Tokyo, the DHB team made it to the quarter-finals, but lost there against Egypt. Now the European Championship is waiting, which Gislason will tackle again with a young team in two years with a view towards the home European Championship.
After several resignations and cancellations, the national coach made a virtue out of necessity and appointed nine tournament newcomers to the 19-man squad. With goalkeeper Andreas Wolff, backcourt players Julius Kühn, Kai Häfner and Simon Ernst as well as circle runner Jannik Kohlbacher, there are only five European champions from 2016 left. “We have an inexperienced team and we need time, but I am sure that we will be on the record with a big heart from the first second,” said Gislason.
President Michelmann also emphasized that it was of the opinion that the team and the experienced trainer “must be given time to go their own way”. Sports director Axel Kromer called the Icelander, who coached the top German club THW Kiel for a long time, “the helmsman” for a young group.
EM preparation starts on January 1st
“Ultimately, Alfred also decided for us. That was already evident in the conversations of the past few weeks, when he was always enthusiastic about the prospects of German handball and the current pool of players,” commented Kromer. Preparations for the European Championship will begin on January 1st with a course in Großwallstadt. “Our plan is in place, we will start working together in the training hall in the new year,” announced Gislason. The contents of the trainer’s contract will no longer play a role.
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