After defending their North America and the Caribbean Handball Confederation (NACHC) title in Carolina, Puerto Rico in April, the United States of America men could look towards their China 2024 campaign with positivity.

Little did they know at the time, but their appearance at the opening stage of the 2024 IHF Beach Handball Global Tour in Marica, Brazil the following month would help in their preparations for the global event.

Three of the four teams they would play in Brazil – Germany, Qatar and Uruguay – would complete their China 2024 preliminary group.

And, perhaps, their results and performances against this trio of teams in South America gives the best indication of what we can expect from the Americans, whose debut world championship appearance in 2016 remains their highest ranking (11th) in three appearances so far – 2016, 2018 and 2022.

For the opening Beach Handball Global Tour stage in Brazil, they beat and lost to Uruguay, opening with a 2-1 (11:10, 20:22, SO 8:2) preliminary group victory before losing 0-2 (14:18, 14:19) to them in the 5/6 placement match to end their stage campaign. In-between, they lost 0-2 to both Qatar (14:16, 13:14) and Germany (18:24, 20:28). Brazil and Argentina also took 2-0 victories in the preliminary stage too.

With these results, which saw the USA compete with three debutants – Jake Johnson, Mike Heffner and Adam King – it is likely they will be targeting their group game against Uruguay as a must-win should they wish to continue through to the main round as one of the three teams from their group. But it will be hard after they lost to the South Americans at the last IHF Men’s Beach Handball World Championship, Greece 2022.

The USA will take heart from their continental exploits though, winning all five of their preliminary games to end on top of the round-robin ahead of the final which saw them beat Puerto Rico 6:2 via shoot-out, thanks to a strong performance in goal from Ebiye.

“Coincidentally, every team in our China 2024 group was invited to stage one of the 2024 IHF Beach Handball Global Tour and each team has representatives that will play at the ‘IHF Beach Handball Showcase’ in Paris this July,” said Ebiye Udo-Udoma, part of that Paris showcase, alongside team Andrew Donlin, to IHF.info.

“This is testament to both the individual and collective calibre within the teams in the group. Our relationship with Uruguay goes back to the 2016 Pan-American Championship final, while Qatar are the reigning IHF Beach Handball Global Tour champions.

“Germany had an incredible continental championship run last year so the games in Group D should be competitive and spectacular.”

In Greece two years ago, the USA defeated Argentina and Puerto Rico, but lost to hosts in their preliminary group, before losing to the Uruguayans (1-2, 21:20, 22:24, SO 6:10) in their opening main round game, swiftly followed by 0-2 losses against Croatia and Spain.

A win against New Zealand meant they had a shot at ninth spot, but a loss to Portugal and then Argentina saw them finish in 12th for the second event running.

Shortly after Greece, they appeared on home sand at The World Games in Alabama, and will take heart from a strong performance against world champions Croatia in the semi-final, losing via shoot-out before going down 0-2 to Brazil in the bronze match.

The USA have shown time and again they have the quality to upset the big boys in one-off games but can they show that quality consistently in China across a tournament and go for that elusive top 10 global finish?

Coach: Michael Hinson

Key Players: Ebiye Udo-Udoma, Cody Dominik, Drew Donlin

Qualification information: 2024 North America and Caribbean Men’s Beach Handball Championships – 1st

History in Tournament: 2004-2014: DNQ, 2016: 11th, 2018: 12th, 2022: 12th

Group at China 2024: Group D: Germany, Qatar, Uruguay, United States of America