The South Korean Men’s Handball U-19 team suffered a crushing defeat against European powerhouse Iceland. The first game of the ranking round was tough.
The Korean men’s handball U-19 team lost 23-38 to Iceland in the first match of Group 2 of the Presidents’ Cup at the 10th World Youth Handball Championship at the Josip Samaja Bepo Hall in Koprivnica, Croatia, on July 7 (KST). It was a “nail-biter.
A total of 32 countries participated in the tournament. The teams were divided into eight groups. South Korea finished fourth in Group D. They didn’t make it to the main round, which is for the top 16 teams, and had to play a ranking match. The International Handball Federation has named this tournament the President’s Cup.
In Group D, third-ranked Bahrain and fourth-ranked Korea were grouped together, and in Group C, third-ranked Iceland and fourth-ranked Japan. Korea will not play Bahrain, their opponents from the group stage, and will play Iceland-Japan twice.
In our first match, we faced powerhouse Iceland. Despite falling in the group stage, Iceland is basically a handball powerhouse. They are also very popular. There were about 50 Icelandic supporters on the field, cheering them on. Even though they didn’t do well in the group stage, Korea had a tough opponent from the first game of the ranking round.
Indeed, the game was not easy. On offense, they were unable to exploit Iceland’s defense at all. On defense, they couldn’t control the Icelandic offense. By midway through the second half, the gap was over 10 goals. A crushing defeat. South Korea will now play their “fateful rival” Japan on the 8th.
The first half was evenly matched. In the first 10 minutes, Lee Min-joon and Choi Ji-hwan scored two goals each, followed by goals from Kim Dong-young and Moon Jin-hyuk. The score was tied at 6-6. Iceland took the lead and Korea chased it down.
At 11:17, Iceland’s Vidarsson was sent off for two minutes, giving Korea a seven-meter throw. Moon Jin-hyuk converted to make it 7-6.
However, goals from Stefansson, Juliusson and Gudmundsson pushed the score back to 7-10. The defense didn’t work, and conversely, the offense couldn’t break through the Icelandic defense.
It was a similar story after that. Goals from Kim Hyun-min, Choi Ji-hwan, and Lee Ho-hyun brought the score back to 10-11 with 22:04 left in the first half. However, two more goals made it 10-13.
Moon Jin-hyuk and Kim Hyun-min scored again to make it 12-13, and they continued to score to make it 13-17 in the 29th minute. One more point was scored in the last minute and the first half ended with the score at 13-18.
In the second half, they tried to catch up, with goals from Lee Min-joon, Lee Ho-hyun, Kim Hyun-min, and Moon Jin-hyuk to make it 17-20, but the defense didn’t 토토사이트 listen again. They gave up back-to-back goals to make it 18-23 eight minutes into the second half, and 18-25 in the final 10 minutes.
On the other hand, the offense was unable to break through the defense, and even when they did, they were blocked by the goalkeeper one after another. Both offense and defense were down. Mental breakdown. The score was 18-27 with 13:05 left in the second half.
There was no breakthrough at all. In the last 20 minutes of the second half, the score was 20-33. It was a moment when the phrase ‘futility’ came to mind. In the end, South Korea lost to Iceland and remained winless in four games.