PHOTO: Bildbyrån
The goalkeepers are not France’s weakness in the EC – at least not if you ask Andreas Palicka.
Here is the Swede’s 92-second defense of his fellow French goalkeepers.
Andreas Palicka has for many years been one of the national handball team’s most colorful profiles. The rescues, the emotional expressions, the talk – everything is top class. So also during this year’s EC in Germany.
“It’s absurd”
When TT meets Palicka ahead of Friday’s EC semi-final against France in Cologne, we make the following statement: Some claim that the goalkeepers are France’s weakness, if you can say so…
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A question doesn’t even have time to be asked before the 37-year-old team captain interrupts and begins to answer:
– Yes, how can you claim that. I think that’s completely absurd, actually, although perhaps you shouldn’t use the term absurd in the newspapers. But I can find it downright disrespectful to those goalkeepers. You have Samir Bellahcene playing in Kiel today, who has gone there and saved the team several times and is playing at an incredible level. He is already and will be a fantastic goalkeeper. A fantastically lovely guy too, you are welcome to write that. Then you have the two goalkeepers from Montpellier – Desbonnet and Bolzinger – who have incredibly fine seasons behind them with two completely different playing styles. So I think they have really good goalkeepers. But I think France lives on in the union that all goalkeepers are still compared to (former great goalkeeper Thierry) Omeyer.
“Is very good”
Palicka is more than halfway into the answer now. He catches his breath for a brief second. Then continues:
– And that’s kind of what we’re trying to get from here in Sweden, that you shouldn’t just have one but have several. And there, I think France is a little overshadowed by these comments and works very, very well. You actually have three goalkeepers, of quite a good age now, who are coming. In addition, you have Vincent Gerard, who is the experienced one who will most likely be in the Olympics, I think. He’s injured right now. But he has been around for many years and has done well in France, so I think they have a good ladder there for their goalkeepers.
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Worst of the law
After just over a minute and a half, Palicka scores. We give him a follow-up question: Perhaps the talk is connected to the fact that it has “only” become a gold for France since Omeyer left in 2017?
– Yes, that can certainly be the case. But it’s easy to always blame the goalkeepers. It’s a team sport after all. Sometimes you are a hero as a goalkeeper, sometimes you are not. In the end, it’s about the team performing together. And that is probably the greatest strength we have as a Swedish team, says “Palle”.
In any case, it is impossible to get away from the fact that the French goalkeepers so far in the EC have the worst save percentage of the four teams that remain in the tournament. If that is the case even on Friday night, much has been won for Sweden.
And then we will surely have reason to talk goalkeeping with Andreas Palicka again.
What do you think of Palicka’s anger? Share the article and have your say!
READ MORE: Sweden’s weapon that will bring great success in the handball EC: “A damn security”
Emil Nielsen, Denmark, 54 saves/137 shots (39.4 percent)
Andreas Palicka, Sweden, 43/115 (37.4)
Andreas Wolff, Germany, 72/199 (36.2)
Samir Bellahcene, France, 45/133 (33.8)
Niklas Landin, Denmark, 42/131 (32.1)
Tobias Thulin, Sweden, 37/121 (30.6)
David Späth, Germany, 18/64 (28.1)
Remi Desbonnet, France, 29/116 (25.0)
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