In five appearances at the IHF Men’s Junior World Championship, Austria have never finished in the top-10 of the competition, with their best result a 11th place in 1989. Poland 2025 also marks their return for the first time since 1997, when they ended up 19th, therefore the clean sweep registered in the preliminary round by the European side looks even more impressive.

The performance looks even more stunning, as this Austria generation did not feature at the M18 EHF EURO 2022, therefore not qualifying between the top 16 teams of the continent. Rather their ascension started at the M18 EHF Championship 3 2022 in Romania, where they won the competition and qualified for the 2023 IHF Men’s Youth World Championship.

There, Austria finished 13th, and made an ever bigger step at the next M20 EHF EURO in 2024, when they ended up on the sixth place. And now, they seem to be one of the biggest surprise packages of the competition, making it to the main round with two points, after their 22:21 win against Hungary.

“It is tough to play in the European Championship, like we did in 2022, because you have to win the whole thing, second place is not enough, in order to qualify to the World Championship. And I think this is where it all started and now we are reaping the benefits of our work,” says Austria’s goalkeeper Leon Bergmann.

Bergmann has definitely been one of the constant performers for Austria during the last few years. The shot stopper was first named the All-Star goalkeeper at the M18 EHF Championship 3 2022, following up with an All-Star berth at the M20 EHF EURO 2024.

But his preliminary round performances at Poland 2024 have been absolutely show-stopping. No goalkeeper has made more saves – 44 – than Bergmann so far. No goalkeeper has registered a better saving efficiency, 43.5%, than Austria’s goalkeeper.

Yet Bergmann stays on the ground, focused exactly on the next tasks at hand, when Austria face Slovenia and Norway in the main round, with a chance to progress to the quarter-finals for the first time in history.

“I'm proud to take part in my team's aspirations, but we're a team, like, you know, I'm only as much part of the team as everybody else, like we have no superstars. We have a team, there's nothing bigger in our team than the team, like the team is really our holy grail,” says Bergmann.

“Nobody and nothing is bigger than the team for us.”

That is a mantra which can also be adapted to the senior national team, where Austria have impressed at the last EHF EURO and went really close to qualify for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, eventually conceding losses against Croatia and Germany in the Olympic Qualification Tournament in Hanover in 2024. Despite having players like Nikola Bilyk, Constantin Mostl, Tobias Wagner or Lukas Hutecek, Austria really rely heavily on their team spirit to perform.

“The chemistry is really good, like really everybody is able to put their ego aside, which is not a small thing, I think, on the men's handball biggest stage, in order to create something big, you need to have this particularity, to leave your ego aside, and that's also what makes us strong, like we're a small country, but we take what we have and make the best of it,” adds Bergmann.

He might be only 21 years old, but Bergmann has already been selected in the extended roster of Austria’s senior team for the 2025 IHF Men’s World Championship, having made his debut against Croatia in the Olympic Qualification Tournament in March 2024.

But with so many players promoted in the past years, what are Austria really doing good?

Bergmann puts it down to determination and desire to be great. And, of course, the players know that if they deliver good performances, a chance to make the step towards a better league in the future.

“For me, the secret is the quality and passion put into it. In Austria, there are only a few people who've got a really big passion for handball, which in my opinion grows even bigger than money,” says Bergmann.

“Because in Austria, there's nobody in handball for money, like there's not a lot of money to be made, and if these people wanted to make money, they would do something else, but just out of pure passion, they're in the game and teaching young people, growing handball in Austria, and those are the people that are responsible for our recent success and also the quality that we produce.”

At 1.95m tall, Bergmann could have become a back or maybe a line player, but he says it was a coincidence that he became a goalkeeper.

“People always ask me this and it was a coincidence, a bit of a coincidence, because in the under 11 age category in my first team, we needed a goalkeeper, and the trainer asked who wants to be a goalkeeper, because we have no one for next season, and my dad was a goalkeeper too, so I just kind of put my hand up and said, okay, I'll try,” smiles Bergmann.

Now, he is one of the hottest prospects between the posts in men’s handball. Having already signed for Kadetten Schaffhausen, the Swiss champions, from the next season, is also a good decision, with Kadetten known to nurture young players and propel them into the stardom.

But until then, Bergmann still wants to write a bit of history with the Austria junior side in his last matches at the younger age category before making the full transition to the senior side.