The first stage of the 2025 IHF Beach Handball Global Tour (BHGT) saw men’s world champions Croatia and 2016 women’s world champions Spain take the titles in Hammamet, Tunisia.

The two-day competition was played at the same venue as the upcoming 2025 IHF Men’s and Women’s Youth Beach Handball World Championships.

With their wins, Croatia men and Spain women have booked their spots at the 2025 IHF Beach Handball Global Tour: Finals Stage between 7 and 9 November, in João Pessoa, Brazil.

Spain women ease to gold in all-European final

After impressing on the opening day with two 2-0 wins from two games (Tunisia 21:16, 24:8, Greece 21:20, 20:14), Spain sealed their gold medal match spot with a 2-0 (17:16, 15:14) win over Croatia in a tight match, which saw Croatia’s Anja Haramina top score, with 14 points.

Petra Dicak had brought her Croatian side within one point of the Spanish women at the end of the first set, with Spain taking a late time out to calm their nerves and despite Ariadna Vazquez making a technical fault when play restarted for Spain, Croatia could not get possession again. 

The second set also Spain win by a single point. This time Spain had led 15:12, before Dicak again brought the score within one at the death. When Sara Hernandez saw her shot saved with Spain’s last possession of the game, it was down to Haramina to take the set to a golden goal, but her single-point effort hit the post and Spain won their third, successive game 2-0.

By contrast, the final women’s preliminary group game saw Greece ease past Tunisia 2-0 (20:11, 20:13) with Aikaterini Koukmisi leading the scoring on 12 points.

With the preliminary group completed, teams rested for the afternoon ahead of the medal matches. In the bronze match, Croatia faced the hosts Tunisia. In their preliminary group clash, Croatia had won 2-0, but this time around it was much tighter. Croatia took the first set 14:13, with Dicak putting her side ahead by one in the last seconds and her side held on with Tunisia seeing their effort from Hanen Romdhan blocked.

The second set saw Tunisia win 19:16 and so it went to a shoot-out, and the result please the home fans as Tunisia powered to a 9:8 win, Ajmi Zayneb scoring her only point in the game after Kristina Smiljanic missed with the first shots of the second round in sudden death after both sides had scored four of their five shots.

The final was a one-sided affair with Spain seeing off Greece 2-0 (16:10, 23:16) with Asun Batista and Sara Hernandez top-scoring on 12 points each.

“A great experience in Africa” as coach Paradzik and his Croatian world champions take men’s title in Tunisia

With a 2-0 (14:10, 24:18) victory over Egypt in their final preliminary group game of the day – and opening one in the men’s competition – Spain, thanks to Alberto Castro’s 14 points, sealed their place in the final.

They would meet Croatia for gold later on despite the Croatians, who topped the table on day one (Friday 13 June) with two wins from two, losing to host nation Tunisia in their opening game of the second day in their final preliminary group game.

After a dominant first set win (28:18), Tunisia powered back to take the second after Ivan Dumencic saw his late shot saved by Wassim Zariat in the Tunisian goal and then Mechergui Seif Eddine recorded a one-pointer to take it to a shoot-out. With the scores equal after one miss each in the first round, Ivan Juric missed his shot in the second round and Tunisia took a 12:10 shoot-out and match victory thanks to Bachar Rhimi’s two pointer.

“Our game against Tunisia show the whole beauty of this sport. After the first set that we won, we were not playing our game in the second. Tunisia played very well and they deserved to win,” said Croatia coach Mladen Paradzik to ihf.info.

“I like their team a lot and think that they have a great future. I take the full responsibility for losing the game, but in some way, sometimes you need to in order to start to appreciate winning, but, once more, I congratulate the hosts for this game.”

The results set up a bronze medal match between the two North African nations, with Egypt easing to a 2-0 (18:12, 19:16) over the hosts, thanks to nine points from Mahmoud Mohamed. Then it was all down to the final between Spain and Croatia, and a place at the BHGT Finals in Brazil at stake.

After Croatia took the first set (26:24), Spain bounced back (24:20) to take it to a shoot-out where they uncharacteristically missed three shots, to lose 6:2 and hand the title to Croatia, with captain Ivan Juric top-scoring on 16 points.

“Spain are a great and experienced team, and no team in the world can say they can beat them easily 2:0,” added Paradzik. “In most of the cases, when you have such strong opponents, you need to search for some small details that can be potential winner's moves. This happened in this shoot-out as well. Of course, it is a lottery and you cannot win always, but you can do your best to search for some small things and the gaps in the opponent movements that you can use during the game.

“That does not guarantee you that you will win it, however at the end of the game you can say that you did the best you could in order to win. This time, everything was perfect, Ivan Juric did the great job, plus goalkeepers later, and this time we won against a great Spanish team.”

New men’s generation coming through for Croatia

Paradzik blooded two debutants in his team in Hammamet, with Anteo Balic and Domagoj Kulis making their international bows, along with Ivan Rukljac, who has only played a handful of games for his nation, back at the 2024 BHGT Finals in Doha, Qatar, last year.

“Balic, born in 2005 and Kulis, born in 2006 had the opportunity to learn from the experienced players and how they need to behave when they play under the Croatian flag,” said Paradzik. “I can say that the boys were assimilated into our ‘Borg Collective’ – if you know Star Trek, and they learned a lot.

“For Rukljac, this is just his second competition with us and since then, he has grown as a player. He has worked on himself, and the results are obvious. As a coach, I am not afraid to put him in a fire during the decision moments and thanks to the IHF Beach Handball Global Tour, we now have a great player in our roster.

“We now have three new and young players who had the opportunity to see Beach Handball at its best. That is the main importance of this competition for us and I am really proud that all of the team as they helped with the inclusion of the youngsters into our system.

“Croatia needs to have a wider base of players if we want to stay on the top and given the fact that we play a lot of tournaments with the national team, we need to introduce new players in order to be competitive at each championship.”

And before returning back to his hotel to celebrate the victory, Paradzik reflected on his own personal experience of participating in Africa for the first time and being part of the BHGT for another year.

“Hammamet is in the perfect position to become a top destination for beach handball. It has nice weather, sandy beaches and handball in Tunisia is quite popular, so all the pre-conditions are set,” he explained.

“It is also a great thing that some things are tried here before the 2025 IHF Men’s and Women’s Beach Handball Youth World Championships starts.

“What I saw here from the Tunisian and Egyptian teams, I would say that Africa has a great potential for beach handball. The IHF Beach Handball Global Tour is a great story and a real stepping-stone of beach handball's presence through the whole year.

“Because of that, and the IHF's efforts to popularise this discipline we are extremely proud and thankful to all organisers of this competition, from the Tunisian Handball Federation who received us well, to the IHF who prepared everything for this competition. 

“The BHGT means a lot to us because with every competition that we play, we have the opportunity to invest in our youngsters so they have the opportunity to collect experience at the top level. All-in-all it has been a great experience in Africa for me for the first time.”

All matches from Hammamet can be watched again on the IHF Competitions YouTube channel.

2025 IHF Beach Handball Global Tour – Stage 1: Hammamet, Tunisia

Results

Preliminary round – Men
Egypt vs Croatia 0-2 (18:27, 14:16)
Spain vs Tunisia 2-0 (22:16, 21:17)
Croatia vs Spain 2-1 (22:26, 26:22, SO 14:12)
Tunisia vs Egypt 2-0 (12:10, 22:14)
Spain vs Egypt 2-0 (14:10, 24:18)
Tunisia vs Croatia 2-1 (18:28, 21:20, SO 12:10)
Bronze: Tunisia vs Egypt 0-2 (12:18, 16:19)
Final: Spain vs Croatia 1-2 (24:26, 24:20, SO 2:6)

Preliminary round – Women
Croatia vs Greece 1-2 (8:28, 16:12, SO 8:9)
Tunisia vs Spain 0-2 (16:21, 8:24)
Greece vs Spain 0-2 (20:21, 14:20)
Croatia vs Tunisia 2-0 (21:20, 19:12)
Spain vs Croatia 2-0 (17:16, 15:14) 
Tunisia vs Greece 0-2 (11:20, 13:20)
Bronze: Croatia vs Tunisia 1-2 (14:13, 16:19, SO 8:9)
Final: Spain vs Greece 2-0 (16:10, 23:16) 

About the IHF Beach Handball Global Tour

The IHF Beach Handball Global Tour was launched at the 2022 IHF Men’s and Women’s Beach Handball World Championships in Greece and debuted in Gdansk, Poland with Croatia winning the men’s tournament and Spain taking the top spot in the women’s tournament. Four teams – Croatia, Germany, Poland and Spain – participated in both the men’s and women’s competitions.

The 2023 IHF Beach Handball Global Tour consisted of four stages, visiting Brazil, Tunisia and Poland before the Finals Stage was held in Doha, Qatar. Qatar’s men and Brazil’s women took the titles.

In 2024, the IHF Beach Handball Global Tour featured three stages, including Brazil, Spain, and then the Finals Stage again in Qatar. Brazil’s men and women won their respective titles.

This year, 2025 sees three stages, starting with Hammamet, Tunisia (13 to 15 June) before moving on to Laredo, Spain from 29 to 30 July. The Finals Stage is due to be played between 7 and 9 November, in João Pessoa, Brazil.

Credit photo: Federation Tunisienne de Handball