Handball European Championship: DHB team struggles to win against Czech Republic

The prelude in Varazdin was successful with a lot of excitement. At the European Championship in Croatia, Germany won their first match in the main round with 22:19 (9:10) against the Czech Republic, thus preserving their chances of reaching the semi-finals. The next match will take place on Sunday against Denmark (18.15 hrs).

In the first 30 minutes against the Czech Republic, the DHB team showed a decent to good performance, including goalkeeper Silvio Heinevetter. As far as the attack is concerned, however, we have to talk about the worst first half of this tournament.

Christian Prokop’s team was clearly affected by the uncertainty. Except for Steffen Fäth, who scored five of the nine goals in the first half, no other player was a significant factor on the offensive. Too many open litters were not hit. Especially Julius Kühn and Paul Drux were completely lost.

Nevertheless, Germany led with two goals (7:5) for the first time in 14 minutes. This was followed by the worst phase, in which no goal was scored for almost eight minutes. The Czechs took the lead in a 3:0 run with 8:7, after 25 minutes it was 8:10 from the defending champion’s point of view.

It was only now that Prokop, who had made an overall effort not to change as much as before, brought Steffen Weinhold, who was so strong against Macedonia. Nevertheless, the underdog, who was trained by Jan Filip and Daniel Kubes, who did not play very well, went into the cabin with a 10:9 lead.

At the beginning of the second half, the DHB team was allowed to play in large numbers for four minutes in a row, but the European champion of 2016 also made a terrible figure. After 35 minutes Czech Republic led with 13:11. It remained a weak performance of the German team in the following time, who were trailing by 16:18 after 47 minutes and were long ago able to thank Heinevetter (12 per cent of 29.41 per cent) and Fäth for still being in the match.

12 minutes before the end Andreas Wolff moved between the posts – an outstanding decision, because the Kieler held strong. In addition, Prokop kept on playing with the seventh outfielder. And in fact, Drux scored his first goal seven minutes before the end of the match, scoring the 19:18. In return, Wolff saved a seven-metre penalty from Ondrej Zdrahala and Jannik Kohlbacher set the score at 20:18 after an outstanding pass from Fäth, shortly afterwards Weinhold even at 21:18. With that, the game was turned and ran.

Initial formation DHB: Heinevetter – Gensheimer, Fäth, Drux, Häfner, Groetzki, Pekeler

Goal scorers Germany: Fäth (8), Gensheimer (3 – 1 of 1 seven-metre), Weber, Kohlbacher, Drux (all 2), Wiencek, Pekeler, Weinhold, Groetzki, Häfner (all 1)

Scorers Czech Republic: Cip (6), Kasparek (4), Zdrahala (4 – 2 out of 3 seven meters), Horak (3), Mrkva, Becvar (both 1)

Fäth and Heinevetter could also stand here without any problems, because both showed a strong performance. However, when Wolff came to the table after 48 minutes at a stand of 16:18, the game was completely tilted towards Germany. The player from Kiel saved a very important seven-metre and only scored one goal (3 out of 4).

Was not a factor at all in the 20 minutes he was on the field. He suffered several ball losses and only hit one of his four throws.