World Championship meeting for EHF Executive Committee

Meeting in Hamburg, Germany, the EHF Executive Committee discussed a range of topics in the first scheduled meeting of 2019.

The IHF President Dr. Hassan Moustafa was also present for part of the meeting. He discussed a number of issues with the Executive, including the future of beach handball, particularly on an IOC level, as well as the huge level of media interest being generated around the World Championship in Germany and Denmark.

The Executive received reports from the federation’s internal political bodies including the Finance Delegation, which reported a positive result in the 2018 final accounting, as well as legal bodies and technical commissions, with a preview of the next round of meetings scheduled for February presented.

An update was given on the positive progress made so far by the EHF and EHF Marketing GmbH together with Infront and DAZN Group on the preparations for 2020, when the new long-term media and marketing contract with the two companies will commence.

Preparations for upcoming meetings

Looking ahead to 2019, the EHF Executive Committee discussed the preparations for official meetings involving member federations.

In April, the next edition of the Secretaries General Conference will take place in Copenhagen, Denmark from 3 to 5 April 2019.

The conference will be organised on the fringes of the draw for the Women’s EHF EURO 2020 Qualifiers, which is scheduled for Thursday, 4 April.

Also on 1 June, ahead of the semi-finals of the tenth edition of the VELUX EHF FINAL4 in Cologne, the Conference of President will take place.

Held in the years between congresses, the conference will see information provided and exchanged with representatives of national federations on issues including the new media and marketing contract starting in 2020 and the future of the younger age category events.

EHF EURO

A report on the most recent major EHF event, the Women’s EHF EURO 2018 event in France, was received.

Further analysis and feedback from the event is currently being collected also in preparation for the Men’s EHF EURO 2020 in Sweden, Austria and Norway when the event will be played with 24 teams for the first time.

Also highlighted were the successful side events, which took place in Paris during the final weekend, including the Women’s Handball Convention, Grassroots Market and the EHF Master Coach/Pro Licence course.

As a follow up to the EHF Executive Committee meeting in December, it was confirmed that the proposal to increase the number of teams at the Women’s EHF EURO in 2024 from 16 to 24 would be further analysed over the coming months. A final decision on the expansion of the event will be made at the next meeting in April.

Anti-doping

The meeting was given an update on the EHF Anti-doping Unit’s testing programme, which is carried out across all EHF competitions.

It was reported that all of the most recent tests carried out at competitions including the Women’s EHF EURO 2018, Women´s World Championship Qualification (Europe) and Women’s EHF Cup were returned negative. Analysis of the results from the Men’s EHF EURO 2022 Qualifiers are ongoing.

It was noted that from 1 February 2019, a change in staffing at the EHF would see Nadezhda Lacina take over responsibility for the coordination of anti-doping tasks in the EHF Office in Vienna.

The Executive also underlined its support for anti-doping education and information programmes to ensure that handball remains a clean sport.

Safeguarding EHF competitions

The measures taken by the EHF to ensure the protection of the sport from issues such as illegal gambling and related fraud were discussed at the meeting.

The contract with Sportradar in the area of fraud detection was also pointed out, with the company providing monitoring tools to safeguard EHF competitions from potential threats as well as intelligence and investigation services.

The EHF Executive Committee underlined its commitment to protecting the reputation of the sport and the fact that any illegal activities, including match fixing or illegal gambling, would be dealt with together with the relevant legal authorities.

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Assistance for development of beach handball

A proposal from the Beach Handball Commission was accepted. This will see the EHF give additional support to the development of beach handball in the future.

Member federations seeking to introduce and develop the sport for the first time will be able to apply for assistance including technical support and equipment from the EHF.

Regulations update approved

An update to the EHF EURO Qualifier regulations for the Women’s EHF EURO 2020 were approved, with the women’s competition to have a separate set of regulations for this competition.

Change of venue for W17 EHF Championship

At the request of the Italian Handball Federation, the venue for the W17 EHF Championship to be played in summer 2019 has been switched from Pescara to Lignano Sabbiadoro.

Change within Methods Commission

Following the resignation of Sjors Röttger, the Executive confirmed that it would be nominating Marta Bon (SLO), who is already a member of the commission, to replace him in the ‘methods and coaching’ role.

Officiating in the future

Looking ahead to the changes in the EHF’s club competition structure from 2020, and following a commitment by the EHF Executive Committee at its meeting in December to pursue a strategy aimed at professionalising the federation’s officiating structure, a summary of the project and next steps was presented.

The proposal will see a change in approach by the EHF on a number of different levels including the education and further education of officials, performance evaluation, the continued development and implementation of technologies in game administration and also in how officials are the nominated for matches and events.

The various topics will be further evaluated and a proposal for amendments and further developments will be presented at the next meeting in April 2019.

Looking back on 2018

Finally, it was noted that the EHF had issued the digital version of the 2018 EHF Business Report ahead of the Christmas break, looking back on all of the federation’s achievements over the past year and that an additional print version had just been made available.