Trondheim welcomes EHF Executive Committee

The eleven members of the EHF Executive Committee, together with senior members of EHF office staff, were in Trondheim, Norway from 17 to 19 September 2015 for their third scheduled meeting of the year and the first of the 2015/16 season.

A full programme of events included a meeting with the Norwegian Handball Federation, where discussions included the federation’s involvement in the hosting of both the Men’s and Women’s EHF EURO 2020 (joint host with Sweden and Austria for the men’s event and joint host with Denmark for the women’s).

The Executive was also welcomed by the Mayor of Trondheim at an official reception. The city will be one of the venues for the Women’s EHF EURO in 2020 and is located in a region with 170 handball clubs and more than 17,000 registered players.

Reports and decisions

The meeting opened on Friday, 18 September with reports from the technical commissions following their latest round of meetings held in Vienna in early September.

Reports were also received from the latest meeting of the Finance Delegation as well as relating to legal management, anti-doping and the federation’s business units and partners.

A key discussion centred on proposals developed by the Competitions Commission for the new qualification process for teams for EHF EURO 2020, from which point the event will be expanded to 24 teams.

The decision was made to deal with these proposals further at the next meetings of the Nations Board and Professional Handball Board (scheduled for 13/14 October 2015) and to present the proposals to the national federations at the Conference of Presidents in Romania on 14 November 2015.

The Executive agreed to adaptations to the regulations for the merging of the Women’s EHF Cup and Women’s Cup Winners’ Cup from the 2016/17 season.

Looking at the proposals made by the EHF Methods Commissions, the Executive Committee approved SMART Projects with Estonia, Lithuania and Belgium; Foster Project with Belgium and France and also signing of the Rinck Convention with Belgium at the upcoming EHF Conference of Presidents in Bucharest on 14 November 2015.

Beach handball

The organisation of the YAC Beach Handball Championship for under 16 teams from 8 to 10 July 2016 in Nazare, 120 km north of Lisbon in Portugal was confirmed. The championship will serve as a qualification for the IHF U17 World Championship in 2017 and Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 2018.

Masters handball

Following an expression of interest in hosting the European Masters Handball Championship in 2016 from five different organisations, the Executive held an internal vote and awarded the event to Porec, Croatia. The championship will take place 17-19 June 2016.

Preparations for EHF EURO 2016

The meeting was informed about the preparations underway for the Men’s EHF EURO 2016 to be played across Poland 15-31 January 2016.

The extensive work of the Polish Handball Federation and EHF EURO 2016 Organising Committee in the preparations for the event were highlighted, as was the organisation of the top referee seminar in Vienna from 28-30 August 2015 and the upcoming Heads of Delegation meeting in Krakow, scheduled for 6-8 October 2015.

A change to the colour scheme of the official event floor, which will be implemented across all senior EURO and Younger Age Category events from 2016 onwards, was approved (full report to follow on eurohandball.com).

The meeting was reminded that the EHF is currently preparing for six major EHF EURO events from 2016 through to 2020 as well as the changes to the playing structure Younger Age Category events from 2016.

Extraordinary Congress

The Executive discussed in detail the Extraordinary Congress to take place in Bucharest, Romania on 14 November 2015.

The motions to the Congress were discussed, including: changes to the age limit for elections (proposed by the Austria Handball Federation), promoting gender equality in handball (proposed by the Norwegian Handball Federation); rules for previous holders of top positions within the EHF (proposed by EHF); multiple candidacies for positions within EHF bodies (proposed by EHF); universality of rules regarding overlapping positions (proposed by EHF).

Next meetings

The schedule of meetings for EHF bodies for 2016 was confirmed, with meetings arranged according to the competitions and events calendar. The meeting programme will be published in due course.

Concluding the meeting in Trondheim, the EHF President, Jean Brihault, thanked the Norwegian Handball Federation for the invitation and their hospitality during the EHF Executive Committee’s stay in Norway.

The EHF Executive Committee will next meet on 12 November 2015 in Bucharest ahead of the Conference of Presidents and Extraordinary Congress taking place on 14 November 2015.

More information

The Norwegian Handball Federation published a report on the visit of the EHF Executive on their website handball.no.