MALMÖ – Comments from players and coaches after matches in Men's EHF EURO 2026 main round group II.

ICELAND vs CROATIA 29:30 (15:19)

Dagur Sigurdsson (ISL) – Croatia head coach

On the victory:

“We played a fantastic game. The guys sacrificed everything, left everything on the floor, so very proud of the team.

“This is a very good victory for us coming back from the disappointment against Sweden, where we didn’t play our game. We did that today and I’m very happy.”

On playing against his home nation of Iceland:

“I’m getting used to it, I’ve done it with so many nations. I don’t get any extra pleasure out of it; I know they want to go far but we are in the same group here, and I just fight for Croatia when I’m in this game.”

On the next game, against Switzerland:

“It’s never going to be easy here. We see it every day, there are some difficult results to get, so we have to find some power to come strongly into that game.”

Mateo Maraš (CRO) – right back

On the second half of the match:

“We like drama, so we put on a show today. I think we had the game in our hands, but there was a strong performance by Iceland in the beginning of the second half, we struggled a little bit.

“When we bring back our playing style I think we deserved our win, and we showed it in the end.”

On his own performance:

“I’m happy for my performance. I think we have here 20 extremely good players who can always play and perform. Today it was a lot of guys from defence to offence, so I think we put all the puzzles together and at the end two points go to Croatia, and we look for the next step.”

On the goalkeepers’ performance:

“When you play good defence of course the goalkeepers also start to shine. We have two or three diamonds in the goal; we have to brush them a little bit so they shine again.”

Luka Cindrić (CRO) – centre back

On the match:

“It was a really hard match, we expected something like this. I think Iceland have amazing players, they play really good. We knew that they will come in the game, but we didn’t lose the focus, we didn’t lose the motivation. I think we deserve this win more than them because we show from the beginning that we want more the win than nothing, because for us every game is a final now.”

Snorri Steinn Guðjónsson (ISL) – Iceland head coach

On the match:

“The first half was not good enough, especially in defence. Overall I’m not that unsatisfied with the performance of my team; of course we lost and we are really disappointed about that. But it was a good fight, they were scoring a lot of goals from nine, 10, 11 metres in the first half. When Croatia have a day like that it’s difficult to stop them.

“I think in the second half we managed a little better, we got some balls in the goal, and we were close, but not close enough.”

On why they could not close the gap sufficiently:

“We were just always one step after that. It’s difficult to chase a team throughout the game. We were also missing four penalties, four, five really good chances, so that’s also really tough and expensive in a game like that. Usually when you lose with one goal it’s the small things here and there.”

On the next game, against Sweden:

“A really tough game and a world-class team, and one who can win the tournament. It will be really difficult, but it’s a European championship and we don’t have much time to be sad, we just have to keep going, focus on the next opponent and try to be ready for that game.”

Óðinn Ríkharðsson (ISL) – right wing

On the defeat:

“These long-distance shots from Croatia were making it difficult for us. While we have to take a look at it, it was not an easy game in defence, they were shooting good. Maybe we need to take more height.”

On the rest of the main round:

“We focus on the next game. Nothing is over, we’re still in.”

Elliði Viðarsson (ISL) – line player

On the match:

“They got a four-goal difference in the first half, and it was hard for us to fight back. We gave it everything we could but they had it in the end.”

On the rest of the main round:

“I was just foucsed on trying to beat them, so now we have to sit and look at it. But it seems that we have to win (against) Sweden in the next game and see what happens after that.”

On what to improve:

“It’s the defence in the first half. It’s not big things we have to change, it’s some lost balls and some things that we missed. It’s small things in this tight match, could have gone both sides.”

Photo © kolektiff images