ROUNDUP: Germany, Poland Meet In Worlds Final After Dramatic Wins

Hosts Germany rode a wave of national euphoria to beat European champions France 32-31 in a double overtime thriller on Thursday for a place in the world handball championships final.

Carried by the 19,000-strong partizan crowd in Cologne, captain Markus Baur got the winner with a penalty shot in the final minute and superb goalkeeper Henning Fritz saved a last-gasp French effort.

In Sunday's final they will be in a revenge mission against surprise team Poland, who beat Germany in the preliminary round (27-25) and in the other semi-final Thursday also required double extra time to outlast Denmark, 36-33, in Hamburg.

Germany are bidding for their third world title, following trophies at the inaugural edition 1938 and in 1978. Poland have never gone that far at the worlds, their best result being third place at the 1982 edition also played in Germany.

"I really cherish this win because I couldn't imagine this to happen two weeks ago. You can't say that we were better than the French. Maybe we had the advantage that we had this fantastic crowd behind us," said Germany coach Heiner Brand.

Polish coach Bogdan Wenta (also a club trainer at German first division side Magdeburg) said: "This is unbelievable. It was our aim to finish in the top seven. Now we are in the final."

In Cologne, France overcame an early 5-3 deficit and never looked back until the final 10 minutes of regulation, when Holger Glandorf brought the crowd back on their feet by giving Germany the lead again at 18-17 en route to extra time at 21-21.

The score was still locked at 27-27 after the first 10 minutes of extra time before Baur's penalty shot for 32-31 settled the affair even though teammate Andrej Klimovets was serving a two-minute penalty.

France thought they had levelled from Michael Giugiu seconds later, but the referees had blown the whistle before for a free throw and the Germans held on for a dramatic win.

French player Joel Abati partly blamed the referees, like other German opponents had done before in the tournament, for their second loss against the Germans following a 29-26 score in the main round. But he also said: "Compliments to the German team which played well."

Baur and Glandorf led German scoring with five goals each, Daniel Narcisse had eight for France.

In Hamburg, Poland looked fresher than the Danes for a long period, but threw away an 18-15 lead as Denmark forced extra time at 26-26 in front of a capacity crowd of 12,500.

The score remained locked, at 30-30, after the first round of extra-time before the Poles decided the match in the final five minutes, breaking a 31-31 tie for a 34-31 lead from two strikes by youngster Michal Jurecki and one by Grzegorz Tkaczyk.

Karol Bielecki led Polish scoring with eight goals while Lasse Boesen had seven for the Danes.

Wenta said that the earlier win against Germany meant nothing on Sunday and that his team had nothing to lose.

"The first result means nothing. The German team has improved and we will be playing against a very motivated team. We have no more pressure now that we are in the final, but we will be looking for our chance," Wenta said.

Earlier Thursday, Olympic champions Croatia beat dethroned title holders Spain 35-27 to reach the match for fifth place. There they meet Russia, 28-25 winners over Iceland, who play Spain for seventh place.

Source: playfuls.com,