It had to happen: this was the crisis. The times when Mar Valencia or Itxako fought for the women’s handball Champions and Spain shone – as much as an Olympic bronze in the 2012 London Games – with players from both teams are far away, too far away. Now everything is grayer. For a decade no Spanish team has played in the top European competition and the team has been losing level until reaching rock bottom. Their exaggerated defeat yesterday against the Netherlands (29-21) was the goodbye to the World Cup in the group stage and, what is worse, the possible goodbye to the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. Only Montenegro’s qualification today for the quarterfinals It would allow Spain to achieve the last of the Pre-Olympic places.
As happened against the Czech Republic, the worst of the setback against the Netherlands was not the result but the feeling that this generation lacks arguments for the elite. The absence of the last references in the tournament –Shandy Barbosa, Nerea Pena and Almudena Rodríguez– forced some young women to grow up and they didn’t. In the future, the selection will be what the center is Paula Arcos and the pivot Lysa Tchaptchet, both 21-year-old players from the Norwegian Vipers Kristiansand, the current European champion, but they need maturity and a lot of company. There are fewer and fewer Spaniards playing at the highest level and dressing the squad will be difficult.
Against the Netherlands, the team that took the 2019 World Cup from Spain, Arcos only found help in Mireya Gonzalez, already a veteran, little more. The selection he leads Ambrose Martin It was more intense and focused at the beginning than in the previous defeat against the Czech Republic, but they found themselves against a higher level opponent. The mirage of the first minutes (2-4, min. 5) faded at half-time (13-9) and the second half was a pure exercise in helplessness. Spain accumulated losses and exclusions while Martín screamed on the sidelines to try the impossible and the Netherlands had fun. An example was the number of balls that reached their ends, Angela Malestein on the right and Zoë Sprengers on the left, who ended up with 11 goals between them. The lack of success in the goal of Mercedes Castellanos y Daryl Zoqbi It didn’t help, but Spain’s problems were too serious for one player to fix.
Now the team only has to sit in front of the television and wait. To maintain their chances of being in the next Olympic Games, they need Croatia to lose today against already qualified Hungary (at 6:00 p.m.) or for Montenegro not to beat Sweden, one of the hosts (at 8:30 p.m.). If one of the two results occurs, Spain will enter the Pre-Olympic, which must play away from home and against the highest-ranked opponents. If not, he will not be in the Games at all – for the first time since 2008 – and will regret the loss of a generation.