The start in Bratislava went according to Alfred Gislason's taste.
On the day of arrival we started training right away – defense.
The national coach initially disliked it in the encouraging test match victory against Olympic champions France on Sunday.
So he wasted no time and had his handball pros practice in the modern Ondrej Nepela Arena on Wednesday afternoon.
The 62-year-old Icelander definitely wants to give his team an offensive 3-2-1 coverage in the tournament.
The Germans, traditionally in a 6-0 formation, should be less easy to calculate.
This is typical Gislason. See mistakes, fix mistakes. He likes this fresh team - if only because the training is sweating again and people really get down to it. "Everyone was broken before the last tournaments and I couldn't do anything right," Gislason complained. Now, in his third big appearance as head coach of the German Handball Federation (DHB), he is finally experiencing the desired starting situation: He doesn't have to take aches and pains into consideration, because there are nine debutants in the German squad, some of them very young, for the European Championships in Slovakia and Hungary .
"The condition of the players is very good," said Gislason on Thursday morning, "on Friday against Belarus everyone will be ready." In all probability, this also applies to playmaker Philipp Weber. He will face an endurance test on Thursday after being forced off the field against France with a bruised shoulder.
As is his way, Gislason warned about the first opponent.
In fact, the top seven of coach Yuri Shevtsov's team plays entirely in Champions League clubs.
Belarus this Friday (6:00 p.m. FAZ live ticker for the European Handball Championship, on ARD and on sportdeutschland.tv) is the strongest opponent in Group D – Austria and Poland are waiting on Sunday and Tuesday.
The last preliminary round opponent of the Germans had five corona cases to complain about shortly after arriving in Slovakia on Thursday.
According to the hygiene concept of the European Handball Federation, the quarantine of players who tested positive during the European Championship can be reduced from 14 to five days if two negative PCR tests are taken.
German pressure is reduced
On Wednesday at noon, the DHB delegation reached the Hotel Lindner in the center of the Slovakian capital. The German handball players have set themselves up on the entire twelfth floor, with a wonderful view over Bratislava, as reported by captain Johannes Golla. You live in single rooms - of course everything is designed to ensure that nobody gets infected with the corona virus. Gislason said: "Everything is going very professionally and correctly in all areas here. We already feel very comfortable and can't say anything negative. We are happy with the hotel.” On Tuesday there were reports that “normal” guests and handball players would meet in Hungarian hotels.
Unlike at the World Cup in Egypt a year ago or the Olympic Games in the summer, expectations of Gislason and the team are, if not low, at least reasonable. From the disappointments of the tournaments since 2016, the DHB has secretly, quietly and quietly reversed its claims. Gislason was actually brought in two years ago as the "difference trainer" who was supposed to turn the well-known circle of professionals into winners in national dress. That failed – in Egypt there were no regular players, in Tokyo there was a lack of strength.
Gislason has now been given a contract until mid-2024 and is entrusted with rebuilding the team that will aim for the stars at the home tournaments in two and five years.
You want to give the team the opportunity to grow together without medal pressure, said DHB President Andreas Michelmann of the “Mitteldeutsche Zeitung”;
the team can “go to the tournament without a backpack”.
Handball influencers like Stefan Kretzschmar are also deliberately reducing the pressure on the inexperienced squad – nobody is talking about the semi-finals, which were always the goal, and regular players like right winger Timo Kastening even think that elimination in the preliminary round is possible.
But even if so little came out, there would be little criticism if the attitude was right.
After all, Gislason has to deal with a whole bundle of problematic issues. Injuries, resignations, Corona, the overload - he is now the change manager, no longer the difference trainer. Mentally, the burden of constantly adjusting to new circumstances is likely to be great. But Gislason's shoulders are broad. At the moment he seems happy, committed, he encourages, he pushes. He has also become more relaxed and no longer takes defeats so personally, players report.
Like all other national coaches, he is dependent on the special German conditions, which are characterized by the strong, sapping Bundesliga.
Except that this time nobody really brought up the subject of fatigue.
Whoever you ask, the word anticipation almost always comes up.
"The many debutants kindled a new fire, while we were kind of in a rut with the old team," says playmaker Weber.
Not an old rut, but a fresh appearance: that obviously has a very invigorating effect on Alfred Gislason.