At the beginning there was praise: “It was a great first half, you have to say that.” Martin Schwalb began his analysis with these well-sounding words, but there was already a less appreciative continuation in this first sentence. But first he wanted to emphasize what his players had done so well on Monday evening in the Leipzig Handball Arena in front of 4,524 spectators. The 61-year-old coach, who is known to have won all possible titles in German club handball, has been in charge of the struggling Bundesliga handball team HC Erlangen for two weeks. And he dominated the German University of Physical Culture Leipzig sports club, which is known to be very strong at home, during the guest appearance in Saxony – but only in the first 30 minutes.
The new playmaker Marko Bezjak directed carefully, the right back player Christoph Steinert acted in his Olympic silver form, the Swede Jonas Svensson scored with powerful throws from the back, left winger Christopher Bissel sank counterattacks with strong nerves. And the defense acted aggressively and attentively in front of the excellent goalkeeper Klemen Ferlin and knew how to stop the dreaded Leipzig speed game. The guests from Middle Franconia deservedly led 17:16 at half-time, and there was no sign of an impending collapse after the break. However, the second round was lost by 8:16 goals, and in the end there was a 25:32 defeat that felt too great – and the end of the delicate upward development of the past few days.
Only the Slovenian national goalkeeper Klemen Ferlin on the Erlangen side can maintain the high level for over 60 minutes
After the bad start to the season with four defeats in a row and the change of coach from Johannes Sellin to Schwalb, they only managed a respectable cup exit (a seven-meter penalty was missed at the last second in the 27:28 against Gummersbach) and then the first win of the season against bottom team Potsdam. And now this upward trend seemed to continue in the fortress that even the heavyweight Rhein-Neckar Löwen did not know how to storm. But only for 30 minutes. Even in this good first half, Erlangen’s deficits, which got the team into trouble last season, became apparent. Throws were unprepared, passes didn’t find their way, and the best chances were missed. The fact that Erlangen still led was thanks, on the one hand, to the outstanding performance of goalkeeper Klemen Ferlin, who not for nothing took fourth place in the Olympics with his Slovenians, and, on the other hand, to a similarly high error rate from Leipzig.
Handball player from THW Kiel
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“It can’t go on like this”: After a season without a title or Champions League qualification, THW Kiel is in a state of upheaval. A new squad is to be created around the newly signed national goalkeeper Andreas Wolff.
But they knew how to effectively decimate the mistakes in the second half and had outstanding goalkeepers in their goalkeepers Kristian Saeveras, who also guards the Norwegian goal, and especially Domenico Ebner in the second half. And the better the SC DHfK Leipzig got going, the more strength dwindled in the ranks of Erlangen. “We only had energy and fire in the first half,” stated a visibly disappointed Svensson on the Dyn microphone. And: “We had the same problems as before.”
His coach sees it similarly: “We made bad decisions and their goalkeeper made our lives hell in the second half.” Schwalb also criticized the team’s physical condition, the far too high number of simple mistakes and the poor shooting yield. How does he plan to deal with this? First of all, you can help the team “with automatisms”. In other words: “A stable defense, a clear counter-attack concept, increasing the pace at the right moment” and the resulting self-confidence. “That’s our way,” says Schwalb, “and then we have to do it over 60 minutes.”
When he took office, the former national player warned how difficult it would be to get away from last place in the table. He took over the HCE there, which he at least managed to do with his first success against Potsdam. “There is still so much to do,” says Schwalb, adding that it is currently forbidden to look at the standings or set goals. At least he took a good measure of hope from the first half in Leipzig: the return of the Polish national center runner Maciej Gebala, who at least performed convincingly defensively in his old place of work; In addition, the increasing form of Svensson and Steinert, the return of playmaker Nico Büdel, the newly assembled team’s growing understanding of the game – in defense and attack.
Nevertheless, Schwalb is aware that all of this has to work for longer than 30 minutes, and as soon as possible: the guest appearance at the Rhein-Neckar Löwen is on the program on Thursday, and a week later the record champions THW Kiel will be a guest appearance. “So what?” says Schwalb, we now know what the path of HC Erlangen should look like. The opponents play a subordinate role.
