Apropos my ‘follow the money’ story from yesterday, involving the Duke of Palma de Mallorca, one always feels tempted to remind that ‘everybody is innocent until proven guilty’. But others prefer to rely on the notion that ‘there is no smoke without a fire’ and, as a former IHF colleague has always cynically stated: ‘the difference between being caught and escaping a verdict is simply how clever one is in hiding the evidence’… That latter point has sometimes been made in connection with accusations and rumors involving the IHF in recent years.

Sadly, it now appears that the image of the IHF is again at stake, and that this time there seems to be no lack of evidence. As reported yesterday, both in Croatia and across Europe, the IHF Treasurer (and President of the Croatian Handball Federation) Sandi Sola was early yesterday arrested by Croatian police when he returned to his country from a handball event in Skopje, Macedonia. Apparently, Croatian media are unusually efficient (or well-informed), as they had already predicted this police action the day before it happened. Or perhaps this was simply expected because several other members of Sola’s family had already been apprehended while he was away.

It should be noted that the whole affair has nothing to do with Sola’s functions as an IHF Treasurer. But it tells what appears to be a devastating story about his suitability for that kind of position of trust and influence. The accusations against Sola and his family are related to his position as the Chairman of the Board of a Croatian bank during the years 2007-2012. The charge involves what is described as fraud, embezzlement and money laundering. The amounts involved are stated to be in the order of U.S. $ 15 million. The early indications are that Sola is initially being detained for at least one month.

Presumably, the affair comes as a major surprise to most people in the handball world. Stories about IHF scandals have tended to be personally connected with the IHF President. In a situation where it has seemed impossible to find persons willing to come forward as candidates for the IHF presidency, it has sometimes been speculated that precisely Sola would be the person who could fit the bill as the future successor to the current President. Now instead, regardless of whether the accusations will lead to an indictment or not, it must be assumed that Sola’s continued presence among IHF Executives will be in serious doubt in connection with the upcoming IHF election congress in October.

Whether it will have any impact on the image and the electability of the IHF President himself is a different matter. But there is little doubt that it is one more major blow to the image of the IHF as an institution! What more can we expect and what more should handball lovers have to tolerate!?

Right at the time when most handball fans in Europe are focusing on the upcoming quarter-finals in the EHF Champions League, they have to switch gear and get out their flags and shirts in support of their respective national teams. This is the ‘middle’ weekend in the qualifying for the Men’s EURO 2014, so all the best national teams in Europe are in action. Of course, with very few teams remaining in EHF club competitions at this stage, it seems the complaints about releasing players to national teams should be limited.

EURO 2014 will be held in Denmark in January 2014, and Denmark is also the defending champion. And this combination will be extremely important for one specific team when the qualifying groups are completed. This is what I refer to in my heading. Normally, two slots would be taken by the organizer and the defending champion, but now we need to reserve one such slot for Denmark. So when we have seven qualifying groups of four teams each, not only will the top two in each group qualify for EURO2014, but the extra twist is that so will the ‘best third-placed team’. By this is meant the team that got the best results against the top two teams in their group. So on the final day, one of seven third-placed teams will be able to celebrate as the ‘lucky loser’. And it will also create some added excitement towards the end, as some games will be more meaningful than otherwise would have been the case.

After all this ‘theory’ what is then the situation at the half-way point? Well, the reality is that we have a mix of exciting and boring groups. There are some groups where it seems pretty clear which two teams will go through. For instance, Hungary beat Croatia today in an emotional game, but clearly both teams will qualify. The same situation involves the group where Sweden today pulled away from Poland in the second half, but these two teams surely will come out on top. Another such group has the young, ‘new’ French team getting the upper hand on Norway, but with the remaining two teams appearing to have no chance. But the other four groups will clearly provide more drama when the qualifying finishes up in mid-June.

Spain seems to be in the most comfortable position as the superior team in its group, but the fight for second place among Portugal, FYRO Macedonia and Switzerland is likely to go ‘down to the wire’. The Germans have put themselves in a tough position, after an earlier defeat against Montenegro was followed by one more letdown against the Czech Republic today. Perhaps Germany will become one of the candidates for the ‘lucky loser’ spot!? Austria created a bit of a sensation today by beating Serbia, where Ilin could not quite manage to carry the team all by himself. With Russia showing good form in this group, the Serbs cannot afford to lose again to the Austrians on Sunday.

Another surprise today was the Icelandic victory in Slovenia, where they turned the game around in the final minutes. This would put the Slovenians in a precarious position, should they lose also in Reykjavik on Sunday, because Belarus would then be a strong contender for the second place in the group. I talked at the outset about club teams having to release players for the national teams. The mere fact that the Icelandic pivot Kristjansson took part in the game against Slovenia today did not go over too well with his club Wetzlar. They promptly canceled his contract. The background is that Kristjansson has been out with a back injury for a long while, unable to play for Wetzlar. So it now seems that he showed his priority for the national team a little bit too clearly.

Finally, it is hard to believe, but the qualifying for the EURO2016 is also underway! Today there was a game in the preliminary round between Great Britain and Italy. For those who had hoped that the Olympic participation last summer would give a boost, today’s result will come as a major disappointment. The Italians won up in Scotland with the score 47-23.

As I have reported in earlier articles, the top European handball clubs have become increasingly frustrated with the total unwillingness on the part of the IHF to treat clubs as stakeholders and negotiate with them. In focus is the IHF’s insistence that the national federations can require clubs to make their players available for the national team, combined with the IHF’s decision to give the clubs some unilaterally determined, modest compensation for releasing the players.

The IHF does not recognize clubs under its By-Laws and feels that it can therefore do what it wants on this issue. So when the clubs work together in their association Forum Club Handball (FCH), they find that they cannot force the IHF to deal with them, neither individually, nor through the FCH. This is a completely different situation from the way in which the European Handball Federation (EHF) fully recognizes both clubs and players and gives them formal representation, just as is the case in football with FIFA and UEFA.

This has now made the clubs and FCH conclude that their only option is to go after IHF indirectly through the national federations. The federations are formally recognized as stakeholders by the IHF, so they are in a position to put pressure on the IHF to change the current situation. But at least some national federations may be unwilling to do so, because at least indirectly it could make them lose some of their power. And of course, it could be seen as entirely fair and appropriate that the clubs go after the federations who are the beneficiaries of having players available for their national teams free of charge.

The FCH could not realistically initiate a lawsuit, as they could not portray themselves as an ‘injured party’ in a legal sense, as it is the individual clubs who pay salaries and lose the services of their players and, even worse, face the consequences in the case a player comes back to the club with a physical injury that occurred while with the national team. So the legally correct approach is for clubs to sue their respective national federations, with the ultimate purpose of having the federations feel forced to put pressure on the IHF.

Accordingly, as a ‘test case’, and in the form of a ‘class action’, a large number of German Bundesliga clubs have now agreed to get together and sue the German Handball Federation (DHB). This is, of course, in itself an extraordinary measure and particularly so as it is in a sense a ‘proxy’ for a legal fight between the clubs and the IHF. Moreover, being the party that is orchestrating the action, the FCH has undertaken to absorb the expenses for the process, rather than having the Bundesliga clubs bearing the risk and burden for action on behalf of all top clubs in a whole spectrum of European countries. And you could even say that the issue goes beyond Europe, as increasingly the players in the Bundesliga clubs and other major European clubs come from non-European nations.

It will indeed be interesting to see how this process evolves, how the federations beyond Germany will react, and how the IHF might react, given that similar measures have been successful in football and other sports.

It is a bit ironic, especially for handball fans here in the U.S. who could enjoy TV coverage thanks to beIN Sport, that most observers seem to agree that the caliber of play was weaker than usual this time. Many point to the fact that several teams found themselves at the beginning (or middle) of a generation change, without sufficient time to integrate new talents fully. Others comment on an unusual rash of injuries, keeping several key players out of the event. And some then tie these observations together and point to the fact that this event was held less than half a year after the Olympic Games in London.

This timing is clearly the worst aspect of the existing competition calendar with five ‘big events’ in four years. So this may have contributed to the unusual extent of injuries, and it also explains why some top players found this the right moment to retire. But it simply also reflects fatigue, both physical and mental, and the difficulty in being in peak form for two events so close together. And it is ‘interesting’ that this problem is highlighted right at the moment when the Europeans are under the ‘cloud’ of the proposal of introducing ‘European Games’ as one more big event in every four-year period…

But there are also questions about the impact of the tournament format. Most of the debate tends to be about the pros and cons of having a ‘main round’ as opposed to the format now used with ‘knock-out games’ starting from the round of 16. Some also have views on the advantages of four groups with six teams vs. six groups with four teams. But personally I sense that the real issue is having an event with so many games between strong and weak teams. This makes it more difficult to keep concentration and maintain a strong and consistent level.

Clearly it is not realistic and appropriate to propose a reduction or to raise the issue of having an ‘A’ and a ‘B’ World Championship as on some occasions in the past. It is a global event and there has to be room for at least a few participants from each continent. But the current format puts a burden in terms of the pure number of games for the top teams, and it has too many uneven games. Yes, the non-European teams want to measure themselves against the Europeans, but how beneficial is it to play several of those 13-38 or 16-43 games before it is time for the President’s Cup? I think one needs to consider a radically different format!

How would it be to allow the eight top seeded teams to stay out of a first phase!? Bring the teams ranked 9-24 into a preliminary round with four groups of four teams. This allows the non-European teams a chance to play opponents from all other continents, including Europe. And then the two bottom teams from each group move on to the President’s Cup, while the top two get to play the seeded teams, with a main round of 16 teams having four groups of four teams. From there on, you move on to quarterfinals for the top teams and placement games for the others.

Not everyone may immediately agree, but to my way of thinking, this amounts to retaining the advantages of the current format while reducing the negative aspects. And I am sure that both our readers and the responsible persons in the IHF and national federations could come up with even better ideas, if there was just a readiness to think ‘outside the box’.

This was expected to become a very close and unpredictable final between the two most dynamic and exciting teams in the championship, each with several potentially dominating players. But it became an amazingly one-sided affair, where Spain was fully in charge from the beginning to the end. A Spanish fan could probably speak or write endlessly about this game, whereas the Danish supporters will quickly want to forget all about it. I will try to find a compromise and just offer some brief comments in addition to the result: 18-10 at half-time, 29-12 after 45 minutes and 35-19 as final score.

If one judged from the quarterfinals and semifinals, this could have been yet another game where Denmark could have gained the necessary advantage in the first half, with the help of Landin in goal, a tight defense, efficient counterattacks and nice goals by Eggert or others. But here none of that worked: Landin did not have a good day, the defense was static and leaked terribly, and the strong Danish shooters got nowhere. Instead, Spain played an inspired handball, supported by the enthusiastic crowd, and everything seemed to work. Sterbik in goal drove the Danes to desperation, while the Spanish attack had no problems finding easy scoring opportunities, from a distance or through elegant passing to the 6-meter line.

So this is what happened and the question is obviously: HOW could it happen? Of course, the Danes are not suddenly a mediocre team. But here, after eight straight wins, it finally became too apparent that world-class player Mikkel Hansen could not be relied upon much in this tournament, and that Landin cannot be realistically in top form every game. And when they Danes encountered an opponent that =, in a sense, was able to use their own methods against them, then they seemed to be lost. Apart from Sterbik in goal, it is difficult to single out a specific Spanish player; they simply had too many weapons in Canellas, Rivera, Maqueda and also Aguinagualde, who showed that he is much more than just a strong circle-runner.

Some cynics will say that it is a big advantage to play a World Championship in your own country, and that is true. It is not a secret that this is a major reason why many of the top countries fight hard for the right to be the host. But Spain has been a top team for a long while and they won gold in Tunisia 2005. In their current form, they could clearly have won this Championship regardless of where it had been played. And Denmark was a worthy finalist despite today’s result. They won all their games before today, most of them in an impressive manner. Of course they might have felt that this year was their turn, just as I myself was ready to believe, but they should gradually adjust to being happy with the silver medals and their standing in the men’s handball today. By the way, the Croatian team, which has been nicely rejuvenated with Duvnjak as their new leader, deservedly won the bronze medals.

So we congratulate the medal winners and I will be back with some post-event thoughts in a few days.

Last time I wrote that Slovenia had been the positive surprise in the early stages. But I also wrote that Poland and Serbia had been the negative surprises. And in the end it became apparent that, when you take that into account, then perhaps it was not so impressive that Slovenia could defeat those two opponents and win their group. Because then they had a relatively easy path first against Egypt and then Russia who self-destructed by playing a dirty game and drawing a lot of suspensions, but when the test came against Spain in the semi-final, the Slovenian skills and team strength were simply not enough. The final result was 26-22 after the lead had been somewhat larger shortly before the end.

Spain had a tough battle against Germany in the quarterfinal, and this was clearly the best game so far, played at a high level and with the usual intensity when these two rivals meet. One could only wish that the same could be said about the remaining quarterfinals, but Denmark did such an impressive job in the early part of their game against Hungary that the game was essentially over at half-time. On paper, the France-Croatia match-up seemed promising, but it was soon apparent that the French team really was just a pale copy of what they have been during their dominance in recent years. There was no cohesiveness, no leadership and, above all, no determination. Croatia was clearly the stronger team throughout the game, and it was pathetic to hear the French comments afterwards about a narrow loss.

The semifinal Denmark-Croatia started in the same way as the Danish quarter-final, with great goalkeeping, alert and agile defense and smart scoring by Eggert and others. But Croatia, where Duvnjak now clearly is the new leader, never gave up. They got to within three goals seconds before the half-time whistle, and the flailing Alilovic took up the competition with Landin at the other end. The pace in the second half was tremendous, with no time for extended attacks. It sometimes looked more like ‘ping-pong’. Croatia desperately tried to catch up, but Denmark always seemed to have an answer. And in the end it became clear that Denmark just had too many different weapons, so the 30-24 win was fully justified. I want to add that it was a very fair and sportsmanlike game.

This means we know have a Spain-Denmark final, pretty much what I had hoped for and believed in. Let us now hope for a ‘grand finale’!

I should be a little bit careful, when for the first time in 20 years I am following a men’s World Championship via TV and internet broadcasts instead of by being present at courtside. But I am really a bit baffled and disappointed overall. Perhaps I have been unlucky, watching the wrong games, but I have not been able to find many brilliant performances by teams or individual players. Instead of technical skills and new tactical ideas, I have seen much more emphasis on physical strength and ‘power handball’, both on defense and offense. I surely hope that we are not seeing the beginning of a negative trend!

It has also been puzzling to see that many teams have been unable to perform at a high level and with good concentration for more than about half of the game, even in games where they desperately needed to win. Teams falling behind do not seem able to use time-outs and new ideas to get back in the game; instead they start getting nervous and frantic, with crazy shooting and technical mistakes. And teams which are easily winning start getting sloppy and undisciplined, perhaps thinking about saving energy for the next game. In some games it has also been apparent that traditionally strong teams must be going through a transition, where the new, young talents have not yet become fully integrated.

Yes, I know I am sounding negative, but I want to optimistic and think that the best is yet to come. On balance I prefer the format with knock-out matches from the ’round of 16′ in comparison with the system of having ‘main round groups’ after the preliminary round. It really seems that we have a great day to look forward to on Wednesday, with two great rivalries in the form of Germany-Spain and Croatia-France; and also the other two quarterfinals look really promising: Denmark-Hungary and Slovenia-Russia. But that is what I said about the match-ups yesterday and today, and especially today became an anticlimax, with three of four matches decided by half-time and Hungary running away from Poland in the second half of the remaining game.

The teams that I will be particularly interested in following are those who are clearly in a transition and therefore quite unpredictable: Germany and Russia. Slovenia is probably for many of us a pleasant surprise; I had never anticipated that they would have a chance to be in the medal round, but that is now quite realistic. I would see a good chance for Croatia to get revenge against France for key losses in recent years, as the French team has so far been confirming the suspicion that they are in decline, whereas precisely Croatia has managed their rejuvenation quite well. And then we will see if the home crowd will be an advantage for Spain or if instead it will cause too much pressure. But I see no reason to change my pre-event prediction that this time it may be Denmark’s turn.

For me the negative surprises have been Poland and Serbia. Both of them got thrashed today. I had thought that one of them would win their preliminary group and then march on to the medal round. It has also been disappointing to see that the gap between the Europeans and the rest seems to be widening or at least not be closing. I had predicted that the young Brazilian team might be the best of the non-Europeans this time and this is how it turned out. They came frustratingly close to eliminating Russia yesterday. Argentina and Tunisia met again in a critical game, just as in the Olympics and again with Tunisia as a winner. But both teams seem clearly weaker than in London.

Of course, it is mainly up to the individual federations, but the IHF also must realize that it is not good for the image of handball when the ‘continental gap’ remains so obvious. Support is urgently needed, because as it now looks, it is regrettably easy to understand why the Europeans argue that their continental events are of higher quality and more interesting.
Let us now at least hope for a great finish in the coming days, so that we can maintain our faith that the quality of the highest level of handball is not declining! And for our handball fans in the U.S.A., it is great to be able to count on high-quality TV transmissions thanks to beIN Sport!

It would be silly to think that Olympic organizers simply are self-less ‘philanthropists’, who go to the effort and expense of organizing the Games just for the sake of the athletes, visitors and TV audiences. Of course they believe that, in one way or the other, it is going to be so beneficial to them that they will turn out to be justified in having made the sacrifices. Their precise motivation may differ from one occasion to another. For instance, much was made of China’s determination to show the world four years ago that they had ‘arrived’ on the world scene in a major way. But that, I believe, is to some extent always part of the picture. The British government clearly made statements somewhat along the same lines. Being able to organize the Olympics in a competent and friendly manner is always going to be a matter of prestige.

And as I see it, as long as we want the Olympic tradition to continue, we should be grateful that there are countries and cities who are willing and able to help us keep it going. It is a totally different matter that some organizers will obviously miscalculate, in their belief that it will all be worth it. Beyond the prestige, there has to be a more tangible, longer-term benefit. Showing off a host city as a place that deserves a major increase in its ability to attract tourists is one calculation. Making a case for being a modern, strong and reliable business partner is another one. Those potential gains are always hard to pin down, but the sense it that reputation of Britain and London surely got a valuable boost.

Therefore, it tends to be more common to point to the benefits for the country’s and the city’s own population. This typically includes the notion that a major redevelopment of a previously lagging part of the city will always be worthwhile. One hopes that this will come true in the long run, because the initial, inevitable upheaval may seem more like a negative to some, even if the approach in London may have been much more considerate than the seemingly ruthless one in Beijing. The construction of new stadiums and arenas is a more double-edged issue. While to some extent new facilities may in fact become useful additions for the locals, more and more the concern has been that the Olympic Games tend to leave behind ‘white elephants’ that will never again be fully utilized. But London seems to have found a good approach, with a clear plan for ‘recycling’ (with Rio 2016 as the beneficiary) or remodeling into more usable facilities.

During the Closing Ceremony, IOC President Rogge referred to the London games as “happy and glorious”. Organizers always hold their collective breath at that moment, hoping for an expression of high praise. Now that, for the first time in a very long while I was not present myself, I still came away with a sense that ‘happy’ was a very appropriate label. The atmosphere around the events and in London seemed to match that. And many of the potential problems that had been discussed in advance did not materialize. There was no crime wave, let alone any hints of the Games being a target for terrorism. Traffic is inevitably going to be a cause for complaints, but how could it not be, considering the huge number of visitors who are not used to finding their way in London. And even the weather cooperated, which may be the most remarkable achievement for a place like London.

Going back to what I said before, it seems more of a concern that the Olympic Games have become a rather overwhelming affair for both host country and host city. So instead of demanding perfection and complaining when we do not get it, we should be appreciative when someone manages to pull it off in an efficient and attractive manner. But one wonders, particularly given the tendency that nobody wants to come across as being less impressive than a predecessor, how realistic it is going to be to find willing and successful organizers in the future, notwithstanding the prestige involved. What countries will be willing to take the risk, and what cities will have the infrastructure and resources to make it work? Of course, some countries may have the political situation and the attitude that ‘the end justifies the means’ and that the will of the people matters less. But it would be sad and dangerous to see such a trend develop, so the question is: what could and should be done to bring the Games down to a scale that would make the demands on an organizer more reasonable!? The options of reserving the opportunity for a handful of locations or else encouraging potential hosts for whom the effort and expense would be unconscionable, seem equally undesirable.

Already during the two Olympic weeks, but even more after the completion of the event, there has been an absolute hysteria around the discussion about ‘the best Olympic athlete of all times’. What caused this particular focus was of course the ability of Michael Phelps to add to his medal collection so that he has now, after three Olympic Games, 18 gold medals and four ‘lesser’ ones. This is obviously much more than anyone else gained throughout a career.

This causes some people to proclaim that the mere numbers make it obvious that Phelps is the best athlete who has ever existed. Let me say that I happily recognize his great achievements, his efforts, and his ability to persist over a considerable period of time. But in my opinion, ANY attempts to use medal counts, or any other method, to try to establish who is the best ever, are completely flawed and really undesirable. I know that it is in the human nature to want to make such comparisons and proclamation, so nothing I say will put a stop to it, but I still want to make my arguments.

I have some appreciation for the desire to make comparison over time within one and the same sport. For instance, who is the best handball player ever? And I understand that it is both tempting and interesting to compare performances in different sports and then try to establish who has made the greatest accomplishments, whose achievement requires the broadest skill set, the strongest talent, or the greatest effort. But for me personally, it is a rather futile exercise, in part because most of us understand too little about each event to be able to compare, and mainly because there are no meaningful criteria by which comparisons across sports can be made.

Presumably that is part of the reason why it is so tempting, and so supposedly convincing, to use medal counts as a basis. But it should be rather obvious that this does not tell us a lot. What is the real reason that Phelps can win so many medals; is it really that he is superior to a boxer, runner, rower, shooter, wrestler or fencer? Well, of course not! Even after I leave out the team sports, it is clear that most other athletes have only ONE chance to win a medal, while a few have a realistic opportunity to win two or more.

In some sports you have different distances or variations that require such similar skill sets that it is realistic to be a multiple medal winner. A runner or kayaker could combine two distances, a tennis or badminton player could win in singles and doubles, and in some individual sports there is a separate medal chance for teams, simply by aggregating the results of individuals. (This latter approach is in my opinion unfortunate, as it goes against the spirit of the Olympic Charter which de-emphasizes such aggregating of results by nation).

Then of course you have a few sports that are designed to be testing the capacity to handle totally different activities, viz., decathlon/heptathlon, modern pentathlon and triathlon. I think it is a good illustration that even the most outstanding participant in decathlon never really has the skills to compete for the medals in one of the ten individual events. To my mind, such versatile athlete would have every reason to wonder why it is possible for others, such as Phelps, to use a much narrower set of skills to win a multitude of medals.

Put differently, again without taking issue with the achievements of Phelps, his ability to win so many medals really speaks more about a clearly inappropriate generosity in the number of very similar medal events in swimming. The ability to win medals in different styles plus in individual medley suggests that there is clear an excess of events, and if you then add the relays it really has gone too far. To start with, one could surely eliminate one distance for each of three ‘special’ strokes and individual medley and two of the distances for freestyle, without creating any unfairness for the participants, if one compares with other sports. And two forms of relays seems to be at least one too many.

The IOC is generally striving to modernize the Olympic Games by inserting new sports, and the efforts and experiments in the Youth Olympic Games seem to be a step in the right direction. Apart from the apparent excesses in swimming, there are other team competitions in individual sports that add very little (except space for additional participants) and there are entire sports that are no longer as ‘modern’ as even their explicit names suggest. As I was noting in an earlier article, a major purpose of the Olympic Games is to be a source of INSPIRATION. But this means that, to get the attention of younger generations, the program of the Games has be constantly renewed, so the IOC would be wise to speed up this effort. And this cannot happen unless some cuts in the current program are made!

I recently wrote about AG Copenhagen (AGK), describing them as a ‘house of cards’ after the dominating owner Jesper Nielsen had suddenly announced his departure. AGK indicated that they would try to find new owners and somehow rescue the status of the club, even though the situation looked grim with the money for players and other expenses lacking.

And this week, with the handball world’s attention being on the Olympic tournament in London, it was made clear that AGK has declared bankruptcy. The club is now reverting to its old form of Albertslund-Glostrup in the Danish 3rd division and the players are considered unemployed. They are entitled to unemployment compensation under Danish law, but many of them will quickly reach the limit for such payments, considering the size of their contracts. Skive who were relegated at the end of the 2011-12 season are now pondering an offer to remain in the top division.

While the players are not likely to have been totally unsuspecting about the end being near, for several of them who are right now focused on Olympic handball it must be an unwelcome distraction. Some of them would normally be eagerly sought after by other top clubs, while others might suddenly consider early retirement. The problem is the timing. At this point in the year, most clubs have their rosters and their budgets firmly set for the 2012-13 season and there are very few who would have the resources to absorb AGK players.

The Swedish trio, Kim Andersson, Ekberg (who is currently performing well in London) and Petersen, may be sure to get offers ‘from across the bridge’ in Sweden, although it is also suggested that Kiel is interested in Ekberg. Boldsen might retire, but he is also speculating about joining a club in Qatar. Having not played in the EURO 2012, he would in fact be eligible for the Qatar national team when they host the World Championship in 2015. Olafur Stefansson might also consider retirement.
The main speculation tends to involved ‘World player of the year’ Mikkel Hansen, but he is not the only one whose name is being linked to a European top club. But only a very limited group of teams would seem to be in the running, e.g., Kiel, Flensburg, Barcelona, Kielce and Veszprem. It will be interesting to see how this sudden ‘market’ will play itself out after the Olympics.

Obviously there are also implications for the EHF Champions League. After their third-place in the past season, AGK was the obvious top seed in one of the main round groups for the coming season. The EHF took a few days to consider this unprecedented situation, and today came out with an announcement. Perhaps some other top teams had hoped for an improved ranking through some kind of ‘chain reaction’, but the EHF went for the simplest solution. The slot of AGK will be taken over by Bjerringbro-Silkeborg (BSF). And the place of BSF in the Champions League ‘wild card qualifying’ was given to Cimos Koper (Slovenia) who had been next in line for such an opportunity. Everything else remains unchanged.

One hopes that some lessons will be learned from the AGK saga. While AGK had successes and was a positive factor as long as it lasted, they now leave a gap in Danish handball and in the Copenhagen region. Particularly at a time of financial difficulties essentially in most of Europe, it seems important that sports clubs at the elite level have a very solid foundation. Relying on the money and efforts by an individual owner or key sponsor is likely to constitute a gamble. The endeavor may be well-intended, but it may easily turn out to be a ‘house of cards’!

Having had responsibilities for refereeing in international handball, and generally being concerned about the risks for match fixing, I have tried to keep somewhat informed about existing betting practices. There are many legal firms in the field of sports betting, and while handball may not be one of their most popular sports, it certainly draws some attention, particularly at the time of the Olympic Games.

However, the real risks in terms of match fixing and a serious impact on our sport come through illegal gambling. Many of you have undoubtedly heard stories about numerous conspiracies that have been uncovered, for instance in the world of soccer, both at the elite level and at very modest levels. Even so, many fans of handball may remain rather ignorant or naïve regarding the possible impact also in our sport.

So I want to share with you that about two weeks ago I was contacted by someone whose name seemed a bit ‘muddled’ and whose firm did not sound like one of the established ones. He claimed to have been directed to me by someone unnamed in international handball who knows me. This may or may not be true. But the purpose was to get my help in coming up with ideas for interesting aspects of a handball game that could serve as a basis for betting.

I was obviously not about to enter into such a collaboration, but I was curious about the whole thing; therefore I pretended not to understand and asked for some explanations of what was meant. So, before I politely indicated that I was not interested, I was then given some examples of what ideas the person already had. I will share these examples below and also include some similar ones that I have come up with myself.

Established betting firms typically accept bets primarily on the final results of a specific game or, in the case of the Olympics, the final winners on the men’s and women’s side. To add some more variations, they may add betting on the goal difference in the final result, the half-time result, which team will first reach 5 or 10 goals, the best individual goal scorers etc. Manipulation of some of these aspects would clearly involve manipulation of the final result of a game or an event.

But what I found was that, beyond what had ever occurred to me, there would be many aspects of a game which would be quite harmless as regards the result of the game, and therefore also would lend themselves much more easily to manipulation that would never be suspected or detected, simply because the impact would not matter very much. So this might seem more innocent in a way, but as long as there are people who are interested in betting money on some of these strange things, then clearly the opportunities and the risks for manipulation by players, officials and referees will increase.

For instance, what would you think about betting on which TEAM will be the first one to request a team time-out, will get the first throw-in, will make the first faulty substitution, will be the first one called for entering the goal area of the opponents, or will be the first one to be shown the forewarning signal for passive play? And would you be prepared to bet on which individual PLAYER will be the first one to get a yellow card, the first one to be called for too many steps, the first one to miss (or save) a 7-meter throw etc. Or would you prefer to speculate about the exact time for the first or last goal of the game, or perhaps the total number of 7-meters awarded or the number of offensive fouls called??

Some of these ideas seem quite mind-boggling; who would take a pleasure in risking some money on that? And could there really be so much money involved that this would be lucrative business for an illegal betting firm or make them prepared to take the risk of ‘convincing’ participants to become involved in manipulation? It may seem difficult to believe, but when there is easy money to be made by unscrupulous people, then everything is possible. And again, the experience from other sports really does make me think that perhaps it is not so farfetched after all.

In my recent interview with the new EHF President, he felt reasonably confident that their protective measures are adequate. And I also hope that we can trust our elite players and referees to have integrity and not be prepared to put their careers at stake. But in several other sports they have said the same thing and have still been proven wrong. So let us be aware and be vigilant!