Handball

Romanian handballers missed the chance to qualify among the worlds top eight teams.

Florin Orban, 13.12.2017, 13:28

The Romanian women’s handball team have missed the chance to qualify among the world’s top eight teams. In the round of 16 at the World Championships recently held in Germany, the Romanian national team was defeated in Leipzig, 28-27, by the team of the Czech Republic. It was a dramatic defeat given that the Romanian handballers had the lead for 55 minutes. On 53 minutes, Romania was three goals ahead of their opponents, with a 25 to 22 advantage displayed on the scoreboard. Yet the Czechs scored four goals in a row, and took the lead.

The Romanians came from behind and levelled the score, 26-all and 27-all, respectively. In the last phase of the game, there were eight Czechs handballers on the court spearheading their attack, whereas the Romanians were deprived of their goalie and had only five players on the court, as Valentina Ardean Elisei was sent off. We should also note that the Romanian national squad was sanctioned 11 times with direct two-minute eliminations, whereas the Czech national squad received similar sanctions only three times.

Romania’s defeat by the Czech Republic came as a surprise, since the Romanians emerged at the top of the table in Group A, while their challengers were only 4th-placed in Group B. Some of the sports commentators attempted to get to the bottom of it, and held the Romanian technical staff and especially manager Ambros Martin responsible for the defeat. The Romanian line-up was not really homogeneous, as the game revolved around one single player, Cristina Neagu.

In the game against the Czech Republic, Neagu scored 13 goals, that is almost half the number of goals scored by the Romanians. Commentators also mentioned the fact that goalkeepers Denisa Dedu and Yulya Dumanska were inexperienced and hardly provided any help for the whole team. Consequently, the high-ranking officials of the Romanian Handball Federation have all the reasons to operate the required changes for the national squad.