Brazilian goalkeeper Barbara Arenhart was almost unbeatable today, but perhaps Denmark will get the chance for revenge in a semifinal!?

It is discouraging to see that, year after year, we cannot find any newcomers from outside Europe among the top teams. Brazil, Angola and Korea are there, and Japan also qualified for the ’round of 16; simply because there were no more than 12 European participants. We now hear rumors that the budget of the International Handball Federation (IHF) could expect a major increase, due to very favorable TV rights contract with Al-Jazeera. Let us hope that finally this will ‘force’ the IHF to spend a more appropriate amount of resources on helping the federations which perennially seem to be next in line to move up and compete with the Europeans. Yes, the newest and weakest federations must also get more help, but for the sake of the image and credibility of handball as a global sport, the priority must be to expand rapidly the ‘middle class’.

We now had a situation where 13 games were won by a margin of at least 20 goals and another 14 games were won by 10 to 19 goals. This should not happen in an elite event. The average goal difference in a game was just about 11 goals! We saw results such as 51-20, 44-21 (twice) and 40-6. And we had a half-time result of 14-0, when the Paraguay team was held scoreless for 32 minutes by their Spanish opponents. By contrast, there were no ties, and only four games (out of 60) were decided by a one-goal margin.

But it could be argued that among the top four teams in each group, there was some excitement in the fight regarding the internal ranking, which determines the likely strength of the opponents in the ’round of 16′ and the path towards the medals. In Group A, France came out ahead, after probably having worried about each of their three pursuers. Montenegro has not shown the same positive spirit as when they won EURO2012, but they managed to come in second. Korea seems far from their old level of medal contenders. In Group B, the top three positions were settled in the very last group game, where Brazil shocked Denmark by grabbing a large early lead which they managed to maintain until the end. This meant that the Serbian hosts got the second place, while Denmark amazingly had to accept third place.

Group C went to the favorites from Norway, followed by Spain, Poland and Angola, even though the Norwegians never looked really convincing so far. In Group D, it was probably a surprise to some that an injury-plagued Germany would manage to beat all the three European opponents. But those teams generally seemed weaker than expected, and especially Hungary was a disappointing shadow of what they have shown during many years now. One gets the impression that it is difficult for many of the European teams to be in top form for a championship every year. Integrating new players and coping with injuries makes it tough.

This leaves us with the following match-ups for the ’round of 16′: in the top half we have Brazil-Netherlands, with the winner playing the winner of Spain-Hungary in the quarterfinal; similarly we have the pairings Denmark-Montenegro and Germany-Angola. In the bottom half, we have first Serbia-Korea and next to them Norway-Czech Republic; in the final quarter of the draw that leaves us with Romania-Poland and France-Japan. About half of these match-ups really would seem to suggest intensive battles. The old Olympic finalists from Denmark and Korea will have to watch out for the local favorites from Montenegro and Serbia. But I will now be brave and predict that in the semifinals we will have a revenge opportunity between Brazil and Denmark and then a repetition of the 2011 final between Norway and France. What Is your prediction?

This is the kind of disgraceful situation that is inappropriately turned into a joke.

Readers of my articles in recent years know that I am often praising the European Handball Federation (EHF) for organizing and running its business and its events in a professional manner, sometimes in contrast with what can be seen from the International Handball Federation (IHF).  But you will then also have noticed that, on several occasions, I have seen clear reasons to criticize the EHF severely, typically regarding issues involving inappropriate distortions of the global playing rules or poor handling of situations where punishment of actions by players and coaches has been required.

One example is the EHF practice to go against the rules and give out automatic suspensions in situations where referees have given a disqualification (‘red card’) under the provision of the rules where they alone have the right decide that the infraction falls into a category for which NO further punishment is warranted.   Another example is the feeble handing of grotesque cases of misbehavior of coaches, where the image of the EHF and of our sport is at stake, but where the EHF has found some excuse for letting the culprit escape with essentially a ‘slap on wrist’.  Examples are the action of the Hypo manager Prokop who entered the court to stop a counterattack for the opponents, and the Serbian coach who held on to the shirt of a player on the opposing team on the court in a game in the 2012 European Championship.  The latter situation was quite inappropriately turned into some kind of joke.

However, during the early stages of the 2013-14 season, the focus has been much more on the effect of questionable refereeing in the men’s and women’s Champions League and most recently in EHF Cup matches.  There has been an abundance of games, especially in the men’s Champions League, where the referees have been unable to control to action sufficiently and where cynical players have ‘taken matters into their own hands’.  As a result, many games have more resembled wrestling, rugby or American football, with players in piles on the floor and with a generally unpleasant atmosphere.  Of course, this reality does not remain a secret, as the EHF-TV webcasts make the scenes available to handball fans around the globe.    In some cases, the issue has been more an apparently deviation from the expectation of equal treatment of both teams, as instead one team, typically the home team, has been getting unwarranted favors.

And the problems have not been limited to the men’s Champions League.  Very recently, a key game, Baia Mare-Thuringer, in the preliminary groups on the women’s side led to strong reaction both from the losing team and from web viewers.  The refereeing was grossly one-sided, as a serious video analysis will easily confirm.  Regrettably, the coach from the losing team was unable to refrain from accusations about bribery.  This is a serious statement which cannot be permitted unless there is clear evidence.  So now the EHF has to investigate both the refereeing and the rash words by the coach.   And as a culmination, we just had the Zomimak-Aarhus game in the men’s EHF Cup, where incompetent referees allowed a level of outright violence that does not belong on a handball court.  A Youtube video clip from this game has caused very negative propaganda worldwide.

It is clear that the EHF competition system is so large that the supply of competent referees may not quite match the demands.  In comparison with the IHF and its handful of World Championships each year, the EHF must rely on a much larger pool, which includes older referees who were not able to qualify for the IHF level, referees discarded by the IHF, and young new EHF referees without much experience.  But I have enough experience from referee nominations and enough up-to-date knowledge of the top referees used by the EHF (in part by following most of the Champions League games on the internet), so I can firmly state that the EHF should be able to do a MUCH better job of matching the available referees with the demands of the games in the different competitions.  I can only speculate about the motivations for what is taking place, but I would label many of the nominations for the Champions League careless, cynical or experimental.

Even worse, a careful analysis makes you wonder about the presence of ‘geopolitical’ considerations, which sometimes seem to outweigh concerns about quality.  Certain referees and referees from certain regions get puzzling assignments where they are ‘in over their heads’ or cannot resist the pressures from spectators, and certain teams seem to get ‘strange’ nominations.   It makes you wonder both about the role of the entire Referee Committee in this regard, and the existence of ‘checks and balances’.  And it gives the impression that, just as in the case of legal procedures (where a ‘hands off’ approach may be more understandable and appropriate), the EHF top management in the case of the management of the refereeing carelessly turns a blind eye to what is happening.   Clearly, the impact is much too important both for the image of the EHF and for our sport overall.

In these circumstances, it is not surprising that it is being rumored that the IHF has found it appropriate to introduce a special effort to monitor and support the IHF referees throughout the year in their performances in their own respective continents.  This has been a shortcoming over many years, especially as new recruits at the IHF level tend be younger and less experienced than in the past, so it is a topic that I myself tried to pursue during my IHF period.  And it is now becoming more realistic, as the IHF Referee Committee is monitoring many continental events outside Europe and as it is possible to follow the top European events through web streaming and video.  The IHF referees benefit from educational efforts and close supervision during the course of World Championships, but they need, and deserve, more continuous and systematic support.  The IHF deserves credit for recognizing that.

The stadium in Sao Paulo was badly damaged irecently in a deadly accident during the final stages of construction

The two most sought after sports events in the world are the Olympic Games and the World Cup in football.   Brazil will host the World Cup next year (so the draw for the groups took place yesterday) and then the summer Olympics in 2016.   Clearly there are many reasons why countries go after these events: the prestige of being able to handle the event, the world-wide publicity and the hope for longer-term tourism revenues, and the domestic PR value and possible boost for the national economy.  But when countries bid for these events, it is not uncommon to downplay the risks and the negative aspects, and many bidders do not care about the public opinion.

The reality is also that both events have taken on such proportions, due to the ‘ratcheting effect’ that flows from the desire to outdo previous organizers, the selfish demands of FIFA and IOC, and the sense that only a really spectacular event will create the PR effect that was sought.  This means that not many countries have the resources and infrastructure to handle the burden, and some of those who do find it better to decline the opportunity.  At the same time, it has become a matter of prestige for both IOC and FIFA to award the events to continents and regions which, for obvious reasons, have not had the opportunity before.   This means that the need for major construction efforts in a difficult setting is becoming more common.

If then, like in the case of the World Cup, Brazil makes it a matter of prestige to spread the event to many more locations than is strictly necessary, and to include places that seem rather farfetched choices, such as Manaus in the Amazonas and Cuiaba near the Bolivian border, then that seems to be asking for trouble.  Several completely new stadiums had to be constructed, whereas others amount to complete renovations of old structures.   All the stadiums were supposed to be finished this month to provide some margin, but clearly this is not going to happen.  Several have work left for the next few months, and the stadium in Sao Paulo, the Itaquerao, which is supposed to host the opening match, is of course now giving special reasons for concern after the deadly accident just a couple of weeks ago,

There is a race against the clock also as regards the arenas for the 2016 Olympics. The IOC is undertaking frequent inspections, and it has been a roller-coaster of gloomy predictions and more upbeat reports of good progress.  There are concerns about many aspects of the infrastructure, such as the roads and the public transit, the scarcity of hotel accommodations, and environmental aspects.  Worries about revenues from key sponsorships and the possibly of interference through public protests also remain.  The IOC President is expected to show up and apply pressure in the next few weeks.

During the ‘Play the Game’ conference, senior Brazilian officials attempted to provide a sense of reassurance.  What had especially raised questions among media and sports officials around the world was the increasing sense that large segments of the public in a football-crazy and sports-minded country such as Brazil had taken to the streets in often violent manifestations against the public expenditure, initially on the World Cup.  In a country where there are widespread and deeply rooted concerns about poverty, public health, the failures of the educational system and the many shortcomings in the investments for basic infrastructure, there are many who doubt the wisdom of the massive one-time investments in sports facilities and directly related projects.  “The country just cannot afford it, the priorities are all wrong, and there will never be a real return on these investments” is the basic complaint.

The Communications Director for the World Cup, Saint-Clair Milesi, tried to paint a different picture.  He emphasized that the infrastructure improvements will be helpful also for the general public, even though massive road and telecommunications projects in the jungle and in the wetlands might seem to be something very different from a more systematic effort focusing on where the most acute needs exist.  Milesi also noted that the public expenditure is surpassed by private investments that otherwise might not be forthcoming.  And the representative from the Comptroller General in Brazil pointed to the savings that his office had been able to achieve in the contracting, and he noted that many projects had actually come in under budget.   But such stories appear to do very little to appease the opposition, and it remains to be seen whether the final construction stages, and then the actual events, will avoid becoming a catalyst for social unrest and massive protests.

IGC Chair Mark Pieth and FIFA’s Walter de Gregorio duing the debate at ‘Play the Game’

During the conference in Aarhus which I attended a month ago, not surprisingly the reform process at FIFA was prominent on the agenda.  It was the topic for a major plenary session and it caused several additional debates.  As I noted in a couple of my own interventions, what happens in FIFA is extremely important well beyond the world of football.  It is the dominating sport in the world, with more media exposure and supporter interest than any other sport, and there are vast amounts of money involved, both in the major international events and at the national level.

So the problems with corruption and terrible mismanagement of the operations and the vast resources of FIFA constitute a concern for the image of all sports and serve as a bad example and an excuse for many other sports, such as handball.  It is disgraceful to hear the IHF president proudly talk about Sepp Blatter as a role model.  Many of the perennial problems with FIFA involve abuse of power and bribery at a personal level among its top figures.  The biggest scandal involved the FIFA marketing partner ISL, through which millions of dollars were paid in bribes to senior officials in FIFA (and the IOC).  Former FIFA President Havelange, and Executive members Teixeira, Leoz and Hayatou were among the main recipients of illicit payments.  President Blatter has somehow managed to ensure a lack of evidence against him.

In separate scandals related to the election of the FIFA Executive Committee and the bidding for the hosting of the World Cup, two other top figures Bin Hammam and Warner got caught more recently.  But the corruption is much more widespread, and the far from democratic election procedures and the bribery-prone processes for the selection of World Cup hosts were always based on shady practices.  The sudden idea of selection hosts for 2018 and 2022 at the same time caused the culmination of shenanigans and accusations.  When Qatar and Russia, whose resources seemed to be as unlimited as their ambitions, came out as the winners ahead of the favored candidates, then ‘all hell broke loose’.  And the notion of playing a World Championship in the heat of the summer was perhaps the real trigger for suspicions and protests.

So in 2011, FIFA found it necessary to establish, with great fanfare, a temporary Independent Governance Committee (IGC) to oversee the creation of a framework for good governance and controls.  Some recommendations were already accepted at the FIFA Congresses in 2012 and 2013, and others are supposedly planned to follow.  But the whole process has been controversial and the sincerity has been questioned.  An intended key player, Transparency International, bailed out from the process almost at the outset, because they did not want to risk their reputation by ‘being involved in a process lacking in credibility’.  The Chair of ICG, Mark Pieth, was initially enthusiastic and optimistic, but when he now spoke at ‘Play the Game’, just before his affiliation with FIFA is ending, he sounded rather more frustrated and said that ‘he had overestimated FIFA’s will for change’!

So what has then been achieved so far?  A Code of Ethics and a supposedly independent Ethics Committee, with separate investigatory and adjudicatory chambers, have been established.  The structure and resources are in place, and FIFA wants to note that the first investigations of misconduct have already been concluded with sanctions as a result.  But the true power and real independence can only be assessed over the longer term.  A revised Audit & Compliance Committee is now in place, with an experienced outsider in charge, and a confidential reporting mechanism (‘whistleblower hotline’) has been activated.    Integrity checks for key officials have been approved.  Apart from these structural aspects, FIFA also emphasizes that, for the first time, a woman has been elected (and two more women have been ‘co-opted’) to the Executive Committee.  But observers note that, on a scale from 0 to 100, these measures only bring FIFA to about 50-55 in terms of overall good governance practices.  Even if all the ICG recommendations one day were to be implemented, it would only bring FIFA to mediocre level of 70, i.e., just short of the rating for the IOC, not exactly a model of excellence in this respect…

Among the many ICG recommendations which have not been implemented, one could mention term limits for the Executive, a committee with external participation that would overlook FIFA compensation practices, salary disclosure, adoption of best-practice anti-corruption standards, guidelines for avoiding conflicts of interest, financial disclosures at all levels of FIFA and its members organizations, transparency in investigatory processes, and adoption of democratic procedures in FIFA election processes.  These are of course rather fundamental aspects of good governance, and the observed reluctance among FIFA Executives, and particularly Blatter himself, to move ahead on these fronts is quite telling.  Where does this then leave us, in an organization that remains under the firm control of a very tight ‘old boys’ network’ and with a president who does not wish to deny his interest in running for re-election yet again in 2015?

With the ICG recommendations left in the hands of these persons, who have shown no genuine interest in affecting major change, in reducing their personal enrichment, or in shedding light on past problems, how optimistic can one be!?   There are many ‘skeletons in the closet’, for instance from the ISL scandal, and many FIFA Executives are likely to be desperate to keep the lid on.  In fact, one of the main objections from Transparency International was precisely FIFA’s refusal to investigate unresolved problems from the past.  Even the FIFA Communications Director, Walter de Gregorio, who was present in Aarhus and had a hard time in putting the right spin on matters from a FIFA perspective, admitted that “FIFA made a lot of mistakes in the past”.  Can the reform process really be credible, if the decision-makers refuse to own up to these mistakes?

During the next couple of months, I will present some tidbits of observations from the ‘Play the Game’ conference which I recently attended.  As I hope some of you have become aware in recent years, when I have made references to the work of this organization, it is the one group in the world of sport, whose efforts in the areas of governance and anti-corruption I really respect and support.  Apart from its continuous efforts, ‘Play the Game’ organizes a global conference every two years.   This time it was held at their home base in Aarhus, Denmark.  Around 400 journalists, sports officials and academics from around the world attended.

The coverage includes a broad spectrum of topics, beyond the general issues of governance, ethics, and corruption in national and international sports organizations. The many problems discovered within the realm of the IOC and especially in FIFA have had a lot of exposure.  Doping-related topics have figured prominently on the agenda for many years now, and the Lance Armstrong affair has only served to increase the concerns regarding doping.  Match fixing has emerged as another core issue, in light of the ever-increasing number of discoveries of such problems in different sports around the globe.

But many issues also relate to the tension or competition between, on the one hand, resources and facilities for sports activities for the masses and, on the other hand, the enormous resources spent on events and stadiums for events such as the OIympic Games and the World Cup in soccer.  Are we catering too much to passive spectators in elite events, at the expense of physical education, health, and fitness for both the young and the adults?   And does it remain sensible to incur such huge expenses for one-time events in countries where the overall population sees many of its basic needs go unmet.

This debate has been particularly acute in recent time, considering the massive construction in Sochi for the Winter Olympics, and the national reactions in Brazil regarding the Summer Olympics in 2016 and the World Cup in 2014.  When soccer-crazy Brazil sees violent demonstrations against these events, then that should perhaps be an eye-opener.   The Winter Games in Russia have caused another debate to surface, namely about the impression that only authoritarian regimes with vast resources can genuinely compete for the hosting of such big events.   Similar questions have come up in connection with Qatar’s successful bid for the soccer World Cup in 2022.

But for the moment I will leave you with this overview of some of the topics that I will expand on in subsequent articles.  I will just add a comment that I received from a Russian journalist who attended the ‘Play the Game’ conference.  It is of course a general trend these days that media reporting from sports events focuses on results, statistics, injuries, transfers and cute background stories about star athletes.  But my Russian friend seemed a bit confused or disturbed at one point:  “why are there so many stories and reports about problems and negative issues”, was his question.  Perhaps he had not quite realized beforehand that this is one of the main purposes of the ‘Play the Game’ organization and its conferences.   There is another side of the coin; sports, unfortunately, does not have just a sunny and glossy side.  There are too many people and issues which serve to undermine the benefits and enjoyment of sports.  We need to shine a light on that!

rather than showing a photo of the IHF president, it seems more logical to have a picture of his two role models, ex-president Mubarak with FIFA’s Blatter

John has already drawn sufficient attention to the presentation I gave under the above rubric at the ‘Play the Game’ conference a couple of weeks ago.  And I offered a preview of the IHF Congress in three articles just before it started.  So in a way there is not much to add now regarding the IHF Congress, as my heading really captures the essence.

There were absolutely no surprises at the IHF Congress.  As I had noted, the President had used different methods to secure the necessary votes well ahead of time.  And this reality was clear to all the Congress participants, including those many who would have liked to see a regime change.  But the IHF president is not a person against whom you launch a battle unless you know that you have a majority of the votes, as he is likely to seek damaging revenge against anyone going up against him.  So there were simply no candidates in opposition to the president and his three colleagues on the Executive Committee.

This limited the ‘excitement’ to the election for the added fifth position on the Executive.  But here the reports from the Congress make it clear that the president had simply let it be known who his preferred candidate was or, better put, the only one for whom he would direct the huge block of votes which he controlled.  The person elected, Frantisek Taborsky of the Czech Republic, a soft-spoken and gentle academic of ‘the old school’, was then not a surprising choice.  Frantisek is a nice person who will not ‘ruffle any feathers’, so the president clearly expects him to be loyal and unlikely to create problems.

All the reports suggest that the Congress swallowed the president’s propaganda speeches, and that nobody seriously questioned why the IHF sets aside such an absurdly small amount of its budget for the development of handball in the small or new handball nations around the world.  Apropos new members, apparently, the president was in a rage when he found that he did not reach the target of 200 member nations, as the final number came out at 199….   Presumably, there will now be a ‘witch hunt’ to determine whose fault this is.

This just confirms that the focus is on the prestige of the numbers, and indirectly also the number of votes that the president can obtain.  It matters less that many of these 199 countries do not really play handball and do not get the support they need and deserve from the IHF.   Similarly, it did not seem to disturb the Congress participants that the amounts of revenue from marketing and sponsors are really pitiful for a sport with the traditions and popularity of handball.  And there are indications that the main sponsor, Adidas, intends to cut back on it support.

It was interesting to be among a large group of sports officials and journalists from especially Denmark and Germany, when the outcome of the IHF Congress was becoming known.  These are, of course, the nations which compete for the honor of having ‘invented’ handball, and our sport has more exposure in these countries than virtually anywhere else.   Moreover, at the end of the Congress, the IHF Council decided to award the hosting of the men’s 2019 World Championship to precisely these two countries.  While there was some enthusiasm about this decision for 2019, it was also quite obvious that most journalists who follow handball know about the basic problems of the IHF.

But they admit that handball and the IHF never get the same exposure as the IOC and FIFA when governance issues and corruption are given some media attention, beyond the normal reporting of match results, player transfers etc.   And to some extent, the defeatist approach of the European Handball Federation and the respective national federations plays a role in that.  When the EHF prefers to focus on its own competitions and affairs instead of taking on the problems at the IHF level, and when the Danish and German federations just ‘turn the other cheek’ and beg the IHF to award a World Championship to them, it becomes more difficult for media to take a lot of interest in all the things that need to change in the global world of handball.  As some journalists commented, “regrettably, we have become far too used to ethics problems and corruption in international sports, so we do not react as strongly as we should.”

Dangerous indications of plans for stronger autocracy still remain.

In the two previous installments (Part 1 and Part 2), I commented on the elections and on issues related to the budget.  In this final pre-Congress article I will make some observations on the ‘motions’ which have been submitted by the Executive Committee and by member federations.  This may seem a rather ‘boring’ topic and I will not get into the small details; instead I will focus more on the overall impression created by these motions.

Motions for Changes in the IHF Statutes

In connection with the previous two Congresses, I strongly criticized the attempts by the IHF president to change the IHF Statutes in ways which were consistently intended to strengthen his power and that of the Executive Committee in totally inappropriate ways, at the expense of all other stakeholders.   On those occasions, several very important provisions were involved, which would have substantially and negatively affected the decision-making process and the operations of the IHF.  Many of these attempts were fortunately resisted by the Congresses and therefore dismissed or modified.

On this occasion, the proposals from the president are relatively more innocent, although only in the sense that they do not involve the ongoing decision-making.  But it is apparent that he cannot just resist the temptation to act in a heavy-handed and top-down fashion, which just confirms his belief in autocracy instead of democracy.  Most of the proposed changes involve new limitations, prohibitions, suspensions and other forms of punishment.  There is also a strong notion of more direct control and interference from the president and the Executive at the level of Continents and National Federations.  Here is the gist of some examples:

– A new clause is being proposed with the suggested intention of protecting the IHF and its member federation from external political influence, clearly in the spirit of the newly elected IOC President, who has always been obsessed with this topic.  It is fine that ‘political influence’ is resisted, but this amounts to hypocrisy when one knows that the IHF has member federations governed by the country’s regime, just like the IOC has many members from ruling families.  Moreover, more external insight is just what the corruption-prone IHF and some its members really do need!

– It is being specified that when continents organize qualifications for the IHF events, these games must be played under the IHF Rules of the Game.  This should be self-evident, as no member federation has the right to deviate from those rules without special permission.  Based on the experience in Asia for the 2008 Olympics, it would seem more important to insist that such events be held with a guarantee of fair play and freedom from manipulation…

– It is proposed that the IHF shall have the right to supervise elections in all member federations, and that they shall be required to invite the IHF president to all congresses of Continental Confederations.   This idea is really laughable or insulting, considering the reputation of the IHF president and the running of the IHF elections.   Moreover, it is proposed that the IHF president should be able to recommend the suspension of a Continental Confederation, its right to be represented in the IHF Council, and its teams participation in IHF events, “if the IHF president deems that the Continental Confederation does not respect normal democratic procedures’!!!   Who is he to judge anyone in such matters??

– You might think that a whole set of proposals regarding an Athletes’ Commission would be a positive step.  But, as I have reminded recently, such a Commission has in theory existed for many, many years, except that the IHF president has not allowed it to work, to meet, to participate in the IHF.  So, even if it is now proposed that the Chair of this Commission should become a member of the IHF Council, the more basic issue is if the Commission is going to be allowed to do meaningful work and have any influence.   Moreover, player representatives have already expressed objections to the idea that the players will not be allowed to nominate their own candidates.   Instead, they will be limited to voting for candidates proposed by the member federations.

Motions from Member Federations on Other Topics

– China and Korea have submitted very similar motions regarding the opportunities for teams from outside Europe to qualify for the Olympic Games.  Currently each continental federation (Europe, Africa, Asia and Panamerica) are guaranteed one participant each. One spot is reserved for the host and the reigning World Champions and the remaining 6 places are awarded in 3 qualification tournaments.  European teams have dominated these qualification tournaments resulting in either 8 or 9 (when Europe hosts) of the 12 nations at the Olympics being European sides.  While this may reflect traditional strengths, it also presents an image of a sport that is not truly global.   China and Korea now want to see at least two entrants from each continent, with a chance for even more non-European teams through qualifying.   The Council has concluded, correctly in my opinion, that this goes too far as it would diminish the quality of the competition.   A more realistic approach might have been to keep the mandatory places remaining unchanged, but with a total of two more slots being reserved for the three continents via the qualifying.  With twelve teams participating in the 3 qualification tournaments, the four non-European nations could simply be placed in the same group.

– Norway is seeking a change in the playing rules.  This is somewhat unusual, as it is normally understood that such changes have a separate process, so the IHF tends to refer proposals to the Rules and Referees Commission.   The motion deals with a genuine issue:  too often it happens that a player tries to fake or exaggerate an injury to get the referees to stop the game, thus avoiding a counterattack for the opponents or simply gaining a tactical stoppage.  So the idea would be that the player would then have to leave the court until there is a change in possession, in the hope that this would discourage the faking.   The idea has some complications, as it equates a ‘fake’ with a genuine injury caused by an opponent, something that may not be so fair.   But what is interesting from a U.S. perspective is that the idea is not new.  It was forcefully pursued by our former federation president Peter Buehning Sr. some 20 years ago.  There was some support at the time, but the IHF concluded then that the complications outweighed the advantages.

Is there any hope for clarity and consequences?

In January 2010, I wrote an article with the title ‘Conflict of interest – or worse’. In a nutshell, it had just been revealed in German media that the IHF President had received a personal services contract to the value of 602.000 Euro from Sportfive, the company holding the IHF TV rights for the period 2006-09. The IHF President claimed that the contract involved compensation for actual work that he was performing. This would make the arrangement a matter of poor judgment. But many observers questioned whether there ever was an intention to have work performed for the money, or if it was simply a camouflage for a ‘kickback’, something that would obviously be a much more serious matter. The former IOC President Rogge went public with his displeasure about the story.

Immediately thereafter, allegations about further wrongdoing started appearing. It was recognized that the Sportfive functionaries who had issued the contract had subsequently left Sportfive and started up a rival, UFA Sports. And can you imagine, somehow it was UFA who surprisingly won the TV rights contract away from Sportfive for the period 2010-13! So questions were raised as to whether the personal contract that these people had arranged, had also been intended to gain them some advantages in the bidding process for the new TV rights period. Certainly the new bosses at Sportfive saw reasons to be very suspicious. Could it be that the bidding had been manipulated, something that would amount to an escalation to criminal wrongdoing??

Then nothing much was heard about the matter until late 2011, when there were remarkable media reports about a police search of the IHF offices and the IHF president’s residence in Switzerland, apparently at the request of the authorities in Hamburg, Germany. One would assume that the investigation had been instigated by the new Sportfive management. Documents were seized by the Swiss police, but then nothing has been heard for a long time. People started commenting that it was perhaps not so unusual that documentary evidence would not exist in the case of a bidding manipulation, or that presumably any such evidence would smartly have been hidden elsewhere.

But this week, suddenly news report came out in Switzerland that shed some new light. A court in Bellinzona announced a decision regarding an appeal from the IHF and its president. (See report in the main Swiss daily, Neue Zuercher Zeitung.) Apparently, most of the documents seized in 2011 had been forwarded to Hamburg, but the appeal involved six documents, five of which the Swiss court has now released. One would assume that these documents must have been seen by the IHF as particularly revealing, as their release was so firmly resisted. Accordingly, it will now be interesting to see whether the access to these documents will give new momentum to the investigation by the authorities. And it will be important to observe whether this new turn might make the IHF president nervous or desperate enough to resort to additional methods to cover up the matter, especially considering that we are just one month away from the IHF Congress. While he is unopposed in his bid for re-election, perhaps a firm final conclusion from the German authorities might be the only thing standing in his way!