As someone who has a keen interest in both geography and handball it should come as no surprise that I’m a bit fascinated with the Faroe Islands and their recent handball success. Geography wise it’s a country so far off the beaten track that most people don’t even know it exists. In between Scotland and Iceland, the Faroe Islands have 52,000 citizens and similar to Greenland they are an autonomous territory of Denmark.

Handball wise they won the first two IHF Emerging Nations Championships in 2015 and 2017 and more recently they played several competitive matches against much larger nations in 2022 European Championship qualification, including a 27-26 win over the Czech Republic. Their most impressive accomplishment?: winning the European U17 Championship in 2019. And, it was not a fluke, they clearly were the best team at this tournament, beating the likes of Norway, Spain, Hungary, Belarus and Sweden.

Further Proof that Small Nations can Compete Effectively in Handball

In the past I’ve highlighted how Iceland with a small population (368,000) has been a pretty successful handball nation. They’ve yet to win a major title, but they are often in the running and they won the silver medal at the 2012 Olympic Games. And, now the Faroes Islands (1/6th the size of Iceland) are taking this concept of small nation handball success to even further extremes.

But, what does this remarkable success mean for a much larger nation like the U.S.? There are a couple of conclusions one might come to. One wrong; one right.

The Wrong Conclusion: If the tiny Faroe Islands can win with modest raw talent… Then the U.S. can accomplish even more with top notch raw talent

If one watches a bit of the Faroe Islands matches from European Championship qualification vs Russia or the Czech Republic it is absolutely striking to see the size disparity of the teams playing. From wing to wing, the Faroe Islands are giving up several inches in height and overall size in general. If you’ve played handball even just a little bit, you know that size isn’t everything. Plenty of smaller, quicker and craftier players have put bigger players in their place.

Case in point, is 19 year old, Elias Ellefsen á Skipagøtu. Check out these plays from Euro Qualification: As Rasmus Boysen pointed out on Twitter: The hype is real part 1; The hype is real part 2 He sure doesn’t look like much, but he’s a big reason behind the Faroe Islands success.

That being said… while size may not be everything, it’s still something. And, not even considering size (which can be easily seen) I think the Czechs and Russians, with the exception of Skipagotu, are also better in terms of raw talent. I don’t think there are any Faroe Islands athletes that would get much playing time if they were playing for the Czech Republic or Russia. Actually, there are probably only 1 or 2 players who would even make the Czech or Russian roster. That’s not a knock on the Faroe Islands handball team. No, on the contrary, it’s the ultimate compliment of their spirit and team play. The old saying that sometimes a “team” is more than the sum of it’s parts really applies here. Big time.

And, here’s where an American watching the Faroes Island’s success might come to a bad conclusion as to what it means for American handball. That train of thought goes something like this:

“Why look at what the Faroe Islands have accomplished with the limited talent they have to work with. Oh my God!  We can easily find 16 better athletes in the vast U.S. and put together an even more competitive handball team.  Bigger, quicker and stronger athletes. They are all over the place in the U.S.  It doesn’t even matter if they’ve never played the game.  We’ll just take athletes that don’t turn professional from other sports and assemble a team.”

Coming to this very wrong conclusion is somewhat understandable. Seriously, more than once during the last two matches, I said to myself, how are the Faroes doing it? But, the more you know about handball… the more you know it’s a very naive and arrogant perspective. One that totally doesn’t understand how hard it is to learn how to play handball at the highest level against professional athletes that have been playing the sport all their lives.

The Right Conclusion: The Faroes Island’s success against more gifted athletes shows what would likely happen with a “quick fix’ American team composed of great raw talent athletes. Perhaps we should instead focus on long term grass roots development.

No, paradoxically we shouldn’t be zeroing in on the raw athletic talent shortcomings of the Faroe Islands as much as we should be looking at their strong technical handball skills and team play. That train of thought goes something like this:

“Look at what the Faroe Islands have accomplished with modestly gifted athletes that have played the sport for several years.  They even compete well against teams with significantly better athletes that have also been playing handball for several years.  I wonder how the Faroe Islands would fare against a bunch of great American athletes that haven’t played handball for very long?   Answer:  The Faroe Islands would beat such a team… relatively easily.

I know this logic runs counter to American exceptionalism. And, if one were to contemplate the juxtaposition of the Faroe Islands squad facing off against a bunch of former NCAA Division 1 athletes who weren’t quite good enough to go pro in basketball, football or some other sport in a game of handball it’s hard to imagine such athletes getting schooled. The size disparity would be dramatic. The quickness and athleticism would also be clear. During warmups one would look at the two teams and think the Faroe Islands has no chance… but dollars to donuts they would school such a team of raw talent transfers.

Why wouldn’t they? After all, they’ve shown they can compete just fine against the Czech Republic and Russia. Pretty good athletes that already know how to play handball. And look closely… the raw athletic talent level of those Czech and Russian national teams is very comparable to the type of raw athletic talent one might see at a number of NCAA Division 1 basketball programs. Guys not headed to the NBA, but maybe to European pro leagues if they want to. Exactly the type of athletes the U.S. has recruited to varying degrees of success for the last 50 years or so.

So when we see the inevitable string of articles, podcast commentary and tweets this summer during the Olympics about how Lebron, Mahomes and others would easily win handball Gold keep in mind the following:

• We’re never getting that level of athlete… we would instead have to settle for good, but lower level talent probably similar to the Czech and Russian teams.
• The Czechs and Russians didn’t even come close to qualifying for the Olympics and they had some real trouble with the Faroe Islands.
• It would probably take a couple of years for such a team to be even capable of beating the Faroe Islands.

Turning Raw Athletic Talent into Handball Players

I’m not saying it’s impossible to take athletes with great raw talent and turn them into handball players. It’s been done many times before… But, always at a significant cost over a long period of time. We can debate as to how much it will cost and how long it will take in today’s current handball landscape. A handball landscape that is way more professionalized today than it was during the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s.

We can and we should have that debate… Put some real dollar figures in terms of cost per athlete per year of specialized and focused training. And compare that cost to the costs to implement various grass roots programs. Maybe, after one runs the numbers it still makes sense to focus on a program similar to our residency programs of the past. Maybe it’s rebranded as more of a European style Academy effort. Maybe a very few, very high quality athletes are identified and sent quickly to Europe. Maybe, but let’s also consider the Faroe Islands and what they have accomplished with a radically different strategy.

Our Dual Citizen, Faroe Islands-like National Team

Also, needing to be factored in: A pretty decent talent pool of dual citizen American athletes which are sort of a Faroe Islands unto themselves. They’ve grown up playing the game, but they are dispersed all over Europe: USA 20 Man Roster for the 2021 WC

It would actually be pretty interesting to see this current U.S. team play the Faroe Islands. The U.S. would probably be around 5 goal underdogs, but we could beat them… probably not in Torshavn though.

• Previous related commentaries
  • The “Iceland Strategy”: Focus a large percentage of USA Team Handball’s resources on one geographical location Part 1; Part 2
  • Expatica Americana: In recent years, Americans that first learned to play handball in another country have played an ever increasing role with U.S. national teams.  This series takes a closer look at what can be expected from this key cohort. (Aug-Sep 2019)
    • Part 1:  What is a handball American Expat and Philosophically, What is an American?:  Link
    • Part 2:  Understanding this 51st state and its handball demographics: Link
    • Part 3: Can a small, but determined handball nation be competitive against larger nations? Can they win a title?: Link

• For more insight on the Faroes Islands and Portugal (another smallish nation making noise) check out this session from the Scottish Handball Association Conference: Link

On Monday, USA Team Handball posted a job announcement for a Women’s National Team Head Coach.  While the job of a national team coach might be a be a relatively straight forward position in most countries with the U.S., the title of head coach has often come with extra responsibilities.

The main job responsibilities of a coach are pretty well known: They are responsible for selecting the best handball athletes available, preparing them during training windows and then coaching the team in international competition.

And, while U.S. National Team coaches have had those responsibilities, historically, this model was insufficient due to the reality that very few people in the U.S. know what handball is, let alone play the game. In other words, there have been few athletes, if any, to select. And, historically, that has meant the added responsibility of creating a team from scratch.

A Nice Addition to the Coaching Search: An Actual Job Description

I’m not exactly sure how the U.S. hired its coaches in the past. I suspect it was mostly done behind the scenes with word of mouth recommendations, followed by lengthy discussions about how the U.S. job would be “different” and how the coach would be responsible for teaching gifted athletes from other sports how to play handball. A not to unreasonable approach given the circumstances and the course of action that had been chosen.

But times change. Circumstances change. And, I think it’s great that USA Team Handball is having an open search and has more clearly defined the job with an actual job description that lays out these extra roles.

First there is a Scope section that summarizes how the job is different:

“Under the general supervision and with the support of Chief Executive Officer of USA Team Handball
(“USATH”), the Head Coach of the Women’s National Team will lead the planning and implementation of the Women’s National Team Program, including, but not limited to, design and implementation of an athlete identification and transition pipeline.

In contrast with athletes that participate in many U.S. sports and the handballers that grow up in Europe, most U.S. athletes will join handball later in life (between 16 and 22 years old). Athletes will oftentimes have elite sport experience in other disciplines (such as basketball, baseball/softball, volleyball, or water polo), prior to starting a career in handball. It is, therefore, the chief responsibility of the Head Coach to facilitate the recruitment of athletes into the USA Team Handball pipeline and to provide the path for their transition into an elite handballer.”

And, then some of these extra responsibilities are further defined:

• Work  in collaboration with USATH CEO and the designated High Performance staff of the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee (“USOPC”) on the development of annual and quadrennial high performance plans.
• Recruit and retain elite athletes for the Women’s National Team pool, both domestically and internationally.
• Leverage existing global handball infrastructure for placing athletes with professional clubs, handball academies, or other similar situations to enhance athlete development opportunities outside of Team USA training camps and competitions, and to establish team opportunities for tournaments and training camps.
• Evaluate the athlete talent pool and continuously upgrade the pool to improve the national team’s competitiveness in international competitions.

The State of U.S. Women’s Handball

Laying out the added responsibilities is all well in good, but probably what’s missing is some context as to just how hard it will be design and implement an athlete identification and transition pipeline.

A while back I started a series of commentaries to address some much needed planning that USA Team Handball needed to undertake.  This series, Charting a Way Forwards for USA Team Handball (Reboot), first identifies “What we have”, then takes a look at “What we want” and then tries to figure out “How we get there”.  I’ve got the first two steps covered, but had paused on the very difficult and challenging 3rd step.  I paused for a number of reasons, but one of those reasons was the enormous chasm between “What we have” and “What we want.”

The series covers everything from National Teams to finances to marketing to grass roots development, but here are the commentaries that specifically address Women’s Handball:

• Demographics: American Citizen Female Athletes (Overview): Link
• Demographics: USA Women’s Elite Player Pool (Overview): Link
• USA Women At-Large and Collegiate Clubs: Link

There are a number of factoids in these articles regarding the current state of the U.S. Women’s program, but underlying everything is the reality that world-wide, there are maybe around 100 American Women that play handball on a regular to semi-regular basis. And, that number will go up or down depending on how loose or strict you want to define “play handball”.

So, if you’re an outside observer, not familiar with handball in the U.S., you’re reaction might well be, “What the hell? I knew handball wasn’t very popular in the U.S., but that’s ridiculous.”

I could go into a long diatribe on why the U.S. is in this position, but that’s not the point here. (If you are interested, there’s plenty to read up on: Link) No, the point here is simply to understand that it is, indeed, reality. And, it’s why the USA Team Handball since it’s inception has almost entirely relied on “transfer talent” from other sports to field it’s national teams. Because…it’s the only way we could even field a team. Further, I should point out that the ages of talent transfer (ages 16-22) listed in the job description are more “aspirational” than a reflection of current reality. Historically, there have been only a handful of stateside national team athletes that first started playing handball prior to graduating from college. And, for the past 20 years or so the average age has been creeping up to somewhere in the mid 20s.

The U.S. Men as a Reference Point: A Focus on Dual Citizens as an Option?

This stateside challenge, as described, is not just a problem for the U.S. Women, it’s also a problem for the U.S. Men. This is perhaps mostly clearly demonstrated by the rapid transformation of the U.S. Men’s National Team from a mix of stateside/dual citizens to almost exclusively a dual citizen squad. Notably, the final 20 man roster for the 2021 Men’s World Championships was comprised of 17 dual citizens and just 3 athletes that had first learned to play the game stateside.

There’s been talk about conducting tryouts and expanding opportunities for stateside athletes, but the reality is that such athletes either entirely new to handball or training at levels significantly below European standards will struggle to make a U.S. roster for years to become. Not because our state side athletes aren’t dedicated or lacking in terms of raw talent, but because the U.S. has been gifted with a pretty good, if not golden, generation of dual citizen athletes. This generational good fortune has meant that very quickly U.S. Men’s Coach Robert Hedin has been able to put together a respectable side that I think would have surprised some folks at the World Championships. Further, the bulk of this roster is actually pretty young and will be around for years to come. That’s not to say I don’t see stateside efforts being built up and eventually more stateside athletes making U.S. rosters. It’s just that it’s going to take several years.

Could the new U.S. Women’s Coach follow the same blueprint as Coach Hedin? Well, undoubtedly whoever’s hired is going to take a look at his current talent pool and try to duplicate it. Unfortunately, while, the U.S. Women have some solid dual citizens they can rely on they have nowhere near the quantity or quality that U.S. Men’s coach, Robert Hedin can rely on. At least, I don’t think there are any hidden Hueter sisters that will magically appear out of nowhere, but I’m open to being pleasantly surprised.

Lacking this dual citizen option and a very thin talent pool means the very difficult task of creating a team from scratch has to be more aggressively pursued. Because if it’s not pursued the U.S. Women will struggle to field a competitive side.

Maybe Coaches Should be Hired to… Coach?

Having been around awhile and having observed and experienced first hand U.S. efforts to create national teams mostly from scratch I’ve come to a conclusion. You can call me old fashioned if you like, but personally I think coaches shouldn’t be hired to design and implement an athlete identification and transition pipeline. I think coaches should be hired to… well, coach.

There’s a couple of reason for this. First, the skill set inherent in planning, designing and implementing a National Team Program doesn’t match the skill set of most coaches. Coaches conduct practices, prepare their teams and lead them in competition. They really know the game and they know how to make their players better handball players. Some of those raw skills could be applied to the very complicated task of planning and designing a National Team Program, but I would argue that it’s a different job requiring greater planning and organizational skills.

The second reason is directly related to the “different mind set” most coaches have. Coaches, at least any coach worth his salt, are hard wired to focus on winning matches. Maybe in the back of their minds they are taking long term goals into consideration, but the focus is primarily figuring out how to win their next match. It’s what they do. It’s what’s expected of them. At the end of the day it’s how their performance as a coach will ultimately be judged. This reality is in direct conflict with the long term goal of building a National Team Program. And, in the unique case of the U.S. with a 2028, seven year timeframe to consider the required mindsets couldn’t be more different. Yes, smart long term program building decisions could in some instances be extremely detrimental to the prospects of near term results.

The analogy (while imperfect) that applies here is the General Manager (GM) / Coach roles and responsibilities split typically used in professional sports organizations. The GM makes the decisions that affect the long term direction of the organization. He ultimately decides what players are acquired and at what cost while the coach is responsible for taking the players he’s been given and… coaching the team. This doesn’t mean that the GM and coach don’t work closely together, just that there is a lead/follower relationship in terms of long term/near term responsibilities.

A Bill Belichick for USA Team Handball?

But, maybe there’s somebody out there in the Handball world who can actually do both the way that Bill Belichick is both the GM and Coach of of the New England Patriots? I guess he’s been relatively successful. That remains to be seen, but I’m guessing he might have higher salary requirements than the $4,800/year currently being offered.

Yesterday, USA Team Handball announced that after 8 years it was parting ways with USA Women’s Coach, Christian Latulippe. There are a lot of euphemisms for getting fired and “parting ways” is one of them. My understanding is that his contract was up and that the decision was made not to renew it. Here’s my take on this decision:

A Strange Hire to Begin With

I’ll make no secret that I didn’t think coach Latulippe should have ever been hired in the first place.  The U.S announcement didn’t mention it, but this was actually Latulippe’s 2nd stint with the U.S. Women as he was also coach from 2004-2007.   As I pointed out in this commentary back in 2013 his first stint with the U.S. was less than stellar.  The metrics included a poor W-D-L record, mediocre recruiting and a failed residency program at Cortland, NY.  He was also fired (or resigned) just prior to a PANAM Games qualification tournament in 2007.  Based on all those factors I saw little rationale for bringing him back in 2013.

A Closer Look at the Latulippe Record

Coach Latulippe’s 2nd time around has produced better results than his first, but there clearly have been far more low points than high points.  Here’s a summary of results from all the major competitions that the U.S. has played in under his tenure.  (Major competitions being defined as events that are either part of World Championships or Olympic Qualification.)

A 19-2-22 record can be described as mediocre or disappointing depending on one’s perspective.  The U.S. has not come close to beating Brazil or Argentina, but can be considered roughly on par with the half dozen teams below those two regional powers.  That being said, more often than not, the U.S. has come up short in the big matches between those similar foes.  Probably the biggest and most disappointing was losing the 2 match PANAM Games qualification series to Uruguay in 2015.  At the time, Coach Latulippe was running a full time residency program and most of the team was practicing together on a regular basis.  To not even qualify for the PANAM Games was a major failure, one that arguably and reasonably suggested that it was time for a major overhaul.

Instead, the U.S. Women’s program has muddled along for the past 6 years.  It was never clearly reported, but the nature of Coach Latulippe’s coaching role shifted in 2015 from a full time residency coach to more of a part time role.  He moved to France, but still coached the team in major competitions and in periodic training camps combined with friendly matches.  The U.S. National Team also started to recruit and add more dual citizens to the roster.  It’s not clear how much Coach Latulippe was paid and what his fully defined responsibilities were, but arguably he did a pretty decent job cobbling together a National Team program with very limited resources.  Certainly the U.S. was travelling and playing quite a few matches vs respectable competition all on a shoestring or nonexistent budget.

Still, the results in the big competitions never materialized.  Meanwhile, similar teams also with limited resources managed to qualify for the World Championships.  Puerto Rico in 2015, Paraguay in 2017, Cuba in 2019.  The 2019 North American & Caribbean Championships were another big disappointment.  The U.S. had qualified for the PANAM Games, but with a World Championship berth on the line the U.S. ended up finishing in 5th place behind Cuba, Puerto Rico, Greenland and the Dominican Republic.  With then recently hired CEO Barry Siff in place, it seemed like a logical time for a coaching change, but no change was made. I’m not sure why, but I suspect with the PANAM Games coming up it was assessed that there wasn’t time to effectively install a new coach before a major tournament.

2019 PANAM Games (The Best U.S. Performance in Years)

At the 2019 PANAM Games the U.S. Women arguably had their best performance in the Christian Latulippe era.  Handed a favorable draw, they took care of Peru and the Dominican Republic and qualified for the semifinals.  It was no surprise that they got overwhelmed by Brazil, 34-9, but they came very close to a bronze medal losing a close match to Cuba, 24-23.  Yes, ironically, Coach Latulippe is getting fired after arguably the best performance by a U.S. Women’s team in a major competition since the 2003 PANAM Games (where the U.S. also placed 4th). 

The Right Decision… Why Did it Take 8 Years?

How a team performed in the last tournament is pretty important, but coaching changes should still be made after assessing the entire body of work. And, if one assesses the entire body of work it’s hard to argue that the U.S. had made great progress or was headed on an upwards trajectory. Results were mediocre at best and really the only logical question is why wasn’t the trigger pulled earlier?

There are likely several reasons, but here are a few that probably came into play:

• Tempered Expectations: With limited resources being applied to the Women’s program could anyone realistically expect significantly better results? No, not really. Slightly better results could and should have been possible. The U.S. should have qualified for the 2015 PANAM Games and probably attended 1 World Championship since 2015. But, qualify for an Olympic Games? Beat Brazil or a European team? Not a chance.
• Minimal Compensation Requirements: It’s not clear what Coach Latulippe’s compensation was during his 8 years at the helm. Initially, he was paid an annual salary, but after 2015 I suspect he was paid minimally. In the USA announcement, National Team player Jennifer Fithian is quoted as saying, “Time and again, Christian has donated his time, money and efforts to give us the opportunity to compete over the past 15 years.” I’ve bold-faced the “donated his time, money and efforts” and that’s pretty telling. Certainly, no handball power National Team Coach is in the practice of donating time and money. Volunteering on some level, however, is a somewhat common practice for developing programs like the U.S.
• Lack of Other Options: Again, the donation of time, money applies here. Behind the scenes, I suspect Coach Latulippe was actually pretty effective at running a shoestring operation. Over the past few years, the U.S. women managed to play quite a few friendly matches in Europe and S. Korea. He also seems to have a great relationship with a core group of athletes that he’s managed to keep together. Could a new coach have been hired to do the same sort of job with the same sort of compensation?

The Right Decision… The Right Time?

The U.S. has a big tournament hopefully coming up this Summer: The North American & Caribbean Championship. The winner will qualify for the World Championships and it may even be hosted in the U.S. The favorite will be the 2019 winner, Cuba, and Coach Latulippe and the U.S. Women came very close to beating that Cuba side at the 2019 PANAM Games. Having coached the U.S. Women for 8 years he knows his roster and his competition inside and out.

We’ll see who the new coach is, but if they are a newcomer to the program they will be coming in blind with a roster and opposing foes they are not familiar with. Making the transition to a new coach even tougher will be the COVID situation likely making it challenging to prepare for the tournament. Maybe they will get a good training camp with some competitive friendly matches before the tournament… Maybe they won’t.

Regardless, it goes without saying that a new coach can be a catalyst for better performances. Heck, it often doesn’t even matter if the new coach is a better coach. Change, in and of itself, is what’s needed. But, on the other hand, sometimes the disruption that results from change presents new problems that can’t be overcome. Assuming there is indeed a Championship this summer it will be very interesting to see how the U.S. Women will respond and perform.

While the upcoming North American & Caribbean Championships are important, the far bigger question is what the plan is for the U.S. Women’s program going forward. Arguably, figuring out that forward is more important than selecting a U.S. coach. In fact, the U.S. probably shouldn’t even hire a long term coach until it figures out what that coach will be responsible for. This will be discussed in more detail in a follow on commentary.