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The final of the European Championship starts in less than an hour. Host and reigning European champion Denmark against two consecutive times Olympic champion, France. Without a doubt the two best European teams as confirmed by the fact that no one but them didn't won the EC since 2004.
Total domination of the French during the whole game and well-deserved title, 41:32.
None of those French or Danish lads ever played against Duxie Walsh - how you can then call them European Champions is beyond me.
Absolutely, my fault. :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by Real ale Madrid
Ah Olympic Handball.
I'll never forget my introduction to it in Primary School. Always wondered why we never excelled at it in this country more.
Not something played at my primary and most likely not played at 99.9% of primary schools across the country. Wonder no more.Quote:
Originally Posted by BonnieShels
That was bad phraseology on my part.Quote:
Originally Posted by ifk101
I mean it's a sport that is set up for us to be actually good at. I have the same opinion of lacrosse.
Why do you think that Bonnie?Quote:
Originally Posted by BonnieShels
I predict Ireland will never ever rise above their confirmed status as the world's worst team in the international rankings.
Us Icelanders are good at this game, we take to it as natural as Norwegians take to skiis and their peculiar individual sports of torture.
But we had to work hard to get to the top level in handball some 10 years ago and managed to stay there ahead of the pack, on merit and against all the odds.
The Euro final was one sided right from the opening minutes, everything that could have gone right for France went their way in those opening minutes, that's the way the game can go sometimes and the other team just have to witness in silent horror, their own shots being saved or hit the post. It was a pity of sorts, because it was expected to be a close humdinger of a final betweeen the 2 best teams. The Danes were impeccible up to the final and the home support were rocking in every game, going well past insane decibel levels. Poland were involved in some exciting games and were the only team to take the French to the wire.
World Handball Championship 2015 is in full swing in of all places, Qatar.
It's unfortunate that the most popular sport in europe after football has to play its premier competition in a dead zone. Qatar managed to purchase 8 players to declare for Qatar. It's just so phoney.
The good news is that the standard of handball is unworldly and quite a few fans from the leading countries made the trip and do their best to create atmosphere but it is a pale shadow of the recent euro finals held in Denmark where the game is loved and the support fanatic.
Best game so far Poland beating Russia
It's on sky sports,so catch a game or two.
Some of the outstanding group pairings to come, before the knockout stage.
Group D
Thurs 22 Germany v Argentina
Sat 24th Denmark v Poland
or at the same time
Group C France v Sweden
Groups C and D are the competitive groups with more evenly matched teams
Croatia and Spain should top Group A and B without too much bother. And one would have to be suspicious at how the draw has set up Qatar with an unprecedented realistic chance to get to the last 8.
They are into the last 16 now. No surprises yet but you get a fair idea of the varying strength of each team. Because of the seeding, the top teams should have little trouble in the last 16, though there's an occasional element of volatility, the close games here are most likely to be between the middling teams.
The real Finals start at the quarter final stage, when the top teams meet each other at the knock out stage.
Remember, your apathy to handball is contributing to Ireland being the lowest ranked team in the world.
Croatians were mad for this game when they were good. I remember one of our auditors working on the (I think) World Championship committee down in Zadar. They built a big mad dome there, we played rugby next to it. Never got into it, a bit too rough, with some quick nasty stuff that'd get you battered in Ireland for. Stuff that even rugby players would think twice about.
Croatians were mad for this game when they were good ??
Croatia are consistently amongst the top 4 teams in the world, they have been semi finalists or finalist in the last 6 Euros and 3 time finalists in the last 6 World championships. Croatia are a power house in world handball.
There were a string of controversial refereeing decisions favouring Qatar in their last 16 game against Austria.
It reached GUBU proportions in the last 20 minutes of the game and the Austrian players were absolutely livid at the end, sarcastically applauding the officials. It was a blatant and obvious case of bribery of officials. I'd say Austria would have won easily by 6, under normal circumstances.
More strange happenings in Qatar at the world championship, Qatar beat Germany in the quarter finals and actually deserved it. Even if there are no qataris in the team, that still was a stunning achievement for a bunch of mercenaries.