Bahrain face Hungary in junior handball worlds

TDT | Manama                                                

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com     

Bahrain’s under-21 national handball team take on their counterparts from Hungary today in their first game of the main round in the 24th IHF Men’s Junior World Championship 2023, currently being hosted by Greece and Germany.

The nationals advanced to this stage for the first time ever in the history of the competition, and as underdogs will be looking to get a surprise victory.

They already have a loss to Sweden, which was a result that has been carried over from the preliminaries.

Today’s game is scheduled for a 5.30pm start, Bahrain time. It will be played at Ano Liosia Olympic Hall in Athens. The Bahrainis’ next game in Group III of this phase will be tomorrow against Denmark.

It will take place at the same venue, starting at 7.45pm. There are three other pools in this stage.

Group I includes Germany, Croatia, France and Tunisia; Group II consists of Portugal, the Faroe Islands, Spain and Brazil; and Group IV features Egypt, Iceland, Serbia and Greece.

The nationals need to finish in the top two to advance to the quarter-finals; otherwise, they will play for ninth to 16th.

That would be their best finish in the junior worlds, having been classified 17th overall the previous two times they played in the tournament in the 1995 and 2019 editions.

The remaining teams who did not advance to the main round are in the consolation pools where they will play for the President’s Cup. Group I includes Poland, Algeria, Libya and the US; Group II features Kuwait, Japan, Angola and Costa Rica; Group III consists of Slovenia, Norway, Argentina and Greenland; and Group IV consists of Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Cuba and Chile.

The Bahrainis are coached by Essam Abdulla. Their roster in the competition includes Abdulla Abdulkarim, Komail Fouad, Sadiq Jaafar, Hussain Ali, Mahmood Al Khunaizi, Mustafa Al Hayki, Ahmed Al Zain, Hassan Khalil, Yasser Qambar, Ali Madan, Ali Redha, Ali Al Asheeri, Hesham Ahmed, Mohammed Hameed, Ali Jameel, Ali Mahmood, Ahmed Redha and Jassim Khamis.