In today’s big final of the Men’s 20 European Championship in Innsbruck Germany met Sweden in a filled up Olympiaworld. In a hard but fair played initial phase both strong defences dominated the game.

Moreover the performance of German’s goalkeeper Jürgen Müller, who could stop the Swedish offence over and over again, was outstanding, too. Sweden thus went into the half-time break with only 8 goals. On the other side the German offence could find a mean against the athletic and manoeuvrable defence of the Swedes more often and scored 11 goals within the first half. With their high back players, Hannes Lindt and Gunnar Dietrich, the German team had two jokers, who scored there goals with strong shots over the adverse defence. The second period started like the first one ended: elaborate tactic which avoided an offence spectacle with numbers of goals. Martin Heuberger, head coach of the Germans, managed it once again to prepare his team perfectly for their rivals and they thanked it for him with an outstanding performance. Germany extended their lead and finally won clearly with 24:19.

Müller Jürgen (GER): “We’ve analysed the strength of the Swedish team very well and could thus adjust to their fast game.”

Martin Heuberger (head coach, GER): “The fans were backing us all the way and sustaining us when we were down. We had 10 great days in Innsbruck, which will certainly stay in our remembrance.”

Experts thought that the duel between Serbia and Montenegro and Denmark will be the final in this Men’s 20 European Championship. But on Sunday these both teams met for the bronze medal match, where the Scandinavians stood up to Serbia and Montenegro with 33:32.

The Serbs have been more awake right from the start and by and by they came to the fore (17:12, 23). The Northern Europeans had - mainly caused by the loss of their injured player Henrik Toft Hansen – big problems in their defence. In the last minutes of the first period the Danes finally got going and turned their top-class chances to account. So they reduced the arrears to 16:18. Only some minutes after the changeover, it wasn’t sure which of the teams will finally be the winner (18:18). The match became an open exchange of blows – but only till the 45th minute. Then the team from head coach Søren Hildebrand, which was cheered by its fans, broke away and gained a 5 goal lead (29:24, 50). Serbia and Montenegro could reduce the arrears, but this didn’t last for a victory anymore.

Mikkel Hansen (DEN): “We have an awesome team and I’m very happy that we’ve won. Thanks to our fans for the great support! ”

Šešum Žarko (SCG): “Due to the injuries we only had 10 players available today. Thus it was very hard. Denmark is a very good team. Congratulations!”