Germany’s handball players passed their character test at the World Cup after an unnecessary thriller and kept their chance for fifth place. Led by a once again outstanding Andreas Wolff, the German team defeated the Olympic fourth-placed Egypt 35:34 (30:30, 17:14) after extra time on Friday and is now fighting for a conciliatory end of the tournament on Sunday.
After a ten-minute phase without their own goal, Germany completely lost the thread in the final phase, lost an eight-goal lead after 42 minutes and had to go into overtime. After captain Johannes Golla (7 goals), playmaker Juri Knorr (6) and Julian Köster (6) advanced to the best German throwers in front of 1604 spectators in Stockholm.
Two days after the quarter-final loss against Olympic champions France (28:35), the team of national coach Alfred Gislason presented themselves as recovered and highly motivated, but the weak phase at the end left many questioning faces. Man of the game was once again Wolff, who made 19 saves after 60 minutes. The decision on Germany’s final placement will now be made during the final day on Sunday. Norway or Hungary will be the opponents in the match for fifth place.
“The boys are very keen not to leave the tournament with defeats, but to develop what we have built up,” Gislason said in an interview with Sportschau before the Egypt game: “That’s only possible with two wins.”
Gislason spreads the game over several shoulders early on – his team thanks him with a strong early phase
For this venture, the national coach had two new players flown in with backcourt player Lukas Stutzke and right winger Lukas Zerbe. Paul Drux from Berlin, on the other hand, left, Djibril M’Bengue and Tim Zechel paused. This new energy quickly made itself felt. Gislason spread the game over several shoulders early on – and his team thanked him with a really strong early phase. It took up to the fifth minute for the first goal to be conceded. And up front, playmaker Juri Knorr cleverly steered the game. “Booooom”, yelled Wolff through the almost deserted Tele2 soccer arena after the keeper had saved the sixth Egyptian shot after a quarter of an hour at a score of 10:6.
And when the agile Kai Häfner netted to make it 15:8 ten minutes later, Gislason called out to his protégés during a time-out: “You’re all doing very, very well.” All the more annoying that the German team conceded six goals in the last five minutes of the first half – and the African champions suddenly came back to three goals. “I hope that the team will keep the focus until the end,” said DHB sports director Axel Kromer at the break: “Then we have a very good chance of winning the game.”
Golla and Co. initially kept their concentration high in the second round. At the back Wolff continued to be world class, at the front Knorr scored twice to make it 24:19 (39 th ). “They’re about to break. We’re tired, but they’re more tired,” said Gislason during a timeout. It was still exciting: Stutzke saw the red card after his third time penalty (52nd) – and Egypt hit the crossbar in the final second of regular time.