Germany: Victory and defeat against Hungary

The earliest that Germany and Hungary can meet at the EHF EURO 2012 is at the Final weekend in Belgrade – so they met in two test matches for their dress rehearsal on German soil.

Each of them celebrated one victory: the Germans, who still have to fight for their ticket for the Olympic Qualification Tournaments in Serbia, took both points on Saturday thanks to a 36:33 (18:16) win, and the Hungarians (already qualified for those tournaments) won the second encounter closely but by a well-deserved 22:21 (13:11) scoreline.

"We still have a lot of work ahead, but the atmosphere within the team is good" said German national team coach Martin Heuberger, for whom the win over Hungary was the first ever in his new position after three defeats at the Supercup in November: "It’s good for my self confidence and also that of the team, that we managed to end this sequence," Heuberger said.

In the first encounter left-winger Uwe Gensheimer was in a class of his own. With twelve goals he became the second top scorer in a single German National Team match in history below Christian Schöne, who hit the net 15 times some years ago against Bulgaria. The wing duo Uwe Gensheimer/Patrick Groetzki (both Rhein Neckar Löwen) showed a strong performance with a total of 20 goals. "It was really fun to play," Gensheimer said.

Hungary had started well and led by a three goal margin in the middle of the first half. But then the Gensheimer engine found its correct temperature and Germany scored one counter attack goal after another. In the middle of the second half the difference was five goals for a long time, before Hungary´s Tamás Mocsai (eight goals in total) took the lead for his team, which reduced the final gap to three goals.

The second match was totally different as it was dominated by both defences. Germany lacked concentration and stability in their attacks, as Hungary defended strongly. Again the guests, led by Ferenc Ilyés, Gábor Ancsin, and Gábor Császár (top scorer of the game with seven goals), had the better start, but in contrast to Saturday, they kept the lead until the middle of the second half.

When Hungary couldn’t score for 13 minutes, German hopes were high for a second victory at 19:18, but then the Mocsai team hit a 4:1 series to decide the game. Germany missed their last shot in the final second.

This match was the last German friendly, but Hungary will have test against Bahrain this week.

Further information

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