11.03.2013, 09:48
Germany shows promising performances against Switzerland

Double test match victory grants the national team some confidence ahead of EHF EURO 2014 qualification

Young German team shows promising performances against Switzerland

In their first matches after the 2013 World Championship in Spain – and on their way to their next crucial EHF EURO 2014 qualifiers against Czech Republic – Germany's men's national team recorded two confident test match wins against Switzerland over the weekend.

In the first match on Saturday Germany powered to 36:22 (19:7) victory, in the second encounter on Sunday Switzerland improved but still lost 25:30 (11:15).

Best German scorer in both games was left wing Kevin Schmidt, who netted 19 (9+10) times in total.

Switzerland had to cope with the absence of some injured players. Furthermore their key playmaker, Andy Schmid, missed the tests as he played with his club, Rhein-Neckar Löwen, in the EHF Group Phase.

Germany missed Patrick Groetzki and Oliver Roggisch for the same reason.

The test saw head coach Martin Heuberger continuing the transition of his team as he had not nominated Holger Glandorf and Lars Kaufmann, while Uwe Gensheimer and Sven Sören Christophersen were sidelined with injuries.

Among the 18 German players nominated ten had less than 16 international matches, and a trio – goalkeeper Jens Vortmann as well as the back court players Christian Dissinger and Fabian Gutbrod – made their international debut against Switzerland.

And the young guns showed a fantastic first match in Wetzlar. Thanks to a stellar performance of goalkeeper Silvio Heinevetter and waves of counter attacks, the score already stood at 16:6 after 24 minutes.

Switzerland committed a lot of mistakes in attack and was overrun completely in the second half, losing the match 22:36.

In the second test on Sunday Switzerland improved, but Germany still held the upper hand, taking home a 30:25 victory.

"It was a very important to nominate those young guns, who had shown their will to develop and who are our base for the future.

"However, in the EHF EURO qualification matches against Czech Republic we will play with a more experienced team," Heuberger said.

"We had the time for experiments now, on 4 and 7 April we need to be in 100 per cent form."

German had lost their opener in the EHF EURO qualification against Montenegro before beating Israel.

Czech Republic also have only two points, while currently first ranked Montenegro (four points) will forge ahead, if they win their two encounters against Israel.

TEXT: Björn Pazen / ts