Since her October 2013 senior Denmark debut Anne Mette Hansen has appeared in 318 games and scored 115 goals, telling you all you need to know about the importance of the back-court player to the Danish women’s side.

Winning bronze in her first IHF Women’s World Championship (Serbia 2013) less than two months after that first game, Hansen went on to appear at two more IHF Women’s World Championships – at Denmark 2015 and Japan 2019, missing Germany 2017 due to a knee injury.

A ninth place finish in Kumamoto at Japan 2019 meant missing out on a possible chance to qualify for the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 with a final main round group game against Serbia ending in a 26:26 draw for the Danes, ensuring they did not qualify for the higher positions and Olympic Qualification Tournaments.

And Hansen is best-placed to know that pain felt on court having seen her shot in the last seconds hit the crossbar agonisingly and rebound to a thankful Serbian defence.

“Of course, it's really painful,” says Hansen to ihf.info at the team hotel in Barcelona. “You have to learn from this experience, we have to learn from it and I hope we have. It's in the hard moments you show who you are and as a team we have to stand together and build up. We are trying to do that as well and look at the positive things we can use and then throw the rest out. I think we have moved a lot from Japan and improved a lot. 

“Compared to last year we think we have done a really good job and we want to build on top of that,” added Hansen about the Danish disappointment of losing the bronze medal match on home ground at the 2020 European Championship in Herning. “We have come far and want to show [here in Spain] that each game we put a level on our play and make it as hard as possible for the opponent to beat us. 

“Especially the mental part, we've done a lot,” explained Hansen about what they have learnt from both Kumamoto and Herning. “The last games in the last championship we have analysed a lot and worked on things that we need to improve on and we learned a lot.

“Hopefully we can show this when we start to play [and] I hope we can take the last step this year. Finally, we're here [in Spain], we are eager to get started now; we're looking forward to the start.”

Despite her long experience with her country, Hansen is always proud to wear the Danish shirt and helps those joining the squad settle in too.

“It's something special this feeling of representing your national team,” said the 27-year-old. “This feeling of ‘yes, I'm representing Denmark’ is something special and every national player can say this.

“We have a really good base and we try to make them feel really welcome and help them if they need it,” said Hansen about the less experienced players joining the squad in Spain, players like left wing Emma Friis. “But the newcomers here have been really good, [they] just jump in with the basics we have on the team; they've done really well and didn't need so much help so far. 

“We really try to build up this base and keep building on top of it – we have to do that throughout the tournament as well and we want to go together and perform as well as we can.”

In their final warm-up games for Spain, Denmark played Ukraine twice, experimenting with a 5-1 defence and Hansen revealed everything is on the table tactic-wise for the team in Spain, with coach Jesper Jensen open to input from his squad.

“We experimented a lot, we try out a lot and then we have to figure out what we can use on and what we have to throw away because we don't have so much time with the national team and have to use every opportunity we have,” explained the Gyor player who has scored 20 goals in the Champions League this season. 

“[5-1] is an exciting element we can use in games and hopefully it will turn out and feel good when we play [it]. If the coach says something then we can come up with some ideas. If he likes it, or we like it, we can implement it, but the coach has the last word. 

“Everybody here on the team listens to each other and if we have ideas from the club, for example, we try to use them – especially if we play together with the one next to you on court, but we try to use as many things we can as possible with the little time we have [for national team] training.”

With Christmas just around the corner, Hansen is also using her global stature to shine a light on those less fortunate, through her work as an official ambassador for the ‘Julemærkefonden’ charity which fights against loneliness and bullying of children.

“As athletes, we have a big role and a big voice so we can use this in a good way,” explains Hansen. “With kids who are getting bullied or don’t have friends, especially it's an important message. If I can help one child to have a better childhood, it's an amazing thing to do. 

“We are now trying to raise some money to help them, so even more children can go to the Julemaerkehjem (homes), so I'm really happy. Because of COVID we haven't visited but when the time's right, we will go and visit and see how they live there and speak with them, see how much fun they have and see how they're getting so many good friends.”