Handball: Revolution instead of small reform: Europaliga in handball to come in 2019

Revolution instead of small reform: The much criticised Handball Champions League gets a completely new face.According to the SID, the European top teams are expected to compete in a clearly structured European league by 2019 at the latest.

If an agreement is reached between top clubs and the European governing body EHF, the winner will be determined after a regular season with round-trip playoff matches.

The EHF did not want to comment on the topic at first on SID request, but invited to a press meeting on Sunday.Immediately before THW Kiel’s Champions League kick-off against the top favourite Paris St.Germain (17.15 hrs in the LIVETICKER) will be informed about the “plans for the new season”.Recently, there had been repeated criticism of the current top-of-the-range mode.The Memorandum of Understanding, the agreement between EHF and top clubs on the current Champions League, runs until 2018.

The new concept foresees a single-track relay with twelve teams, for which the champions of the international top leagues are basically qualified.The runner-up from the relatively strong Bundesliga will probably also be eligible for the runner-up spot.At the end of the regular season, the top eight teams in the knockout system will then play the title – the quarter-finals will be followed by the Final Four in Cologne, which remains untouched in its current form.

“If you don’t want to let handball die slowly in Europe, you can only do so in a more attractive mode,”THW Managing Director Thorsten Storm told SID.Kiel’s coach Alfred Gislason had already suggested an elite league,”a kind of handball NBA”, and the top European players all want that.We will see a year-round European league in the next few years,”said Storm.

In order to compensate for the six additional games for players who are already on their gums, the workload of the national teams in qualifying for major tournaments is to be reduced.In addition, there are thought games about a new reform of the DHB Cup, where German royal class starters could be suspended.

Storm believes that the Bundesliga clubs “need the introduction of such a European league the least”.But other top international clubs are dependent on this competition because of their weak national leagues,”or else it could happen that a world club like Barcelona will eventually sign off,”said Storm.An overall development of “our sport” cannot “stop”outside France and Germany.

nearby

The current form of competition, as at least German clubs have agreed since the 2015 reform, has no future.On the one hand, the complicated mode with two groups of eight teams each and two teams each with six teams, as well as the tricky qualifying criteria for the round of sixteen, are a source of discontent.On the other hand, due to the new TV contract in Germany, the schedule has reached a new level of quality with fixed matchdays on Thursdays and Sundays.

Not only managing director Dierk Schmäschke from the SG Flensburg-Handewitt, who will start into the royal class on Saturday at 5.30 p. m. /Sky) with a home game against the Danish club Aalborg, deplores games in a 48-hour rhythm:”It is very important that HBL and EHF reach a compromise and a good cooperation and that we achieve the possible.Fixed dates for Champions League matches would of course be important,”said Storm.