In the very first duel between the two sides, the Faroe Islands were taught a lesson in and by the Czech Republic.

After the Czechs were been closely defeated by Russia on Wednesday, they were unleashed and took a dominant 28:20 win in a one-sided match on Friday night – the opener of a packed weekend of qualifiers for the Men’s EHF EURO 2022 in Hungary and Slovakia.

GROUP 3
Czech Republic vs Faroe Islands 28:20 (14:8)

• the Czechs picked up their first two points in their second EHF EURO 2022 qualifier, after their first four matches were postponed due to Covid-19
• this was also the first win for Rastislav Trtik in his second stint as the Czech national coach, after succeeding Jan Filip and Daniel Kubes
• the Faroe Islands remain on zero points after two matches. The game in Brno was their 30th defeat in 32 EHF EURO qualifiers so far
• after only nine minutes, the gap was already four goals at 6:2; thanks to a 3:0 run, the hosts netted for the 14:8 half-time advance
• the Czech lead was five or six goals for most of the match, but the Faroese ran out of energy in the final minutes and scored only four times in the last 15 minutes

Experience strikes between the post

Martin Galia and Tomas Mrkva are one of the most experienced duos in European handball, playing at the highest level for over a decade. Galia made his first international impression at the EHF EURO 2004.

More recently, the 32-year-old Mrkva has become the favourite between the Czech posts – mainly as he produced an outstanding performances at the EHF EURO 2018 in Croatia. On Friday night, Mrkva – who plays for German side Bergischer HC – showed his class again with 18 saves.