Just once have Bulgaria appeared at an IHF Beach Handball World Championship – and what a global debut it was for the European nation.

In 2006, their women’s senior side qualified for the IHF Women’s Beach Handball World Championship in Brazil and they just missed out on a podium spot, losing to Russia in the bronze medal match.

Fast-forward to now, almost 20 years on, and their U17 women’s team have booked their place in the 2025 IHF Women’s Youth Beach Handball World Championship in Tunisia.

But their journey there was not so simple.

An eighth place finish at the continental qualification tournament – the YAC 16 EURO 2024 held on home sand in Varna – was not enough to qualify initially, despite it being an historic result for them. However, they were eventually offered a spot, taking the place initially offered to Oceania.

Their European campaign saw them make history and qualify for the quarter-finals after ending their preliminary round campaign with a 2-0 win over Romania (29:20, 14:21, SO 10:6). This had followed expected 2-0 losses against Hungary and Germany, with two wins sandwiched in-between, against Poland and Serbia.

But their chances of a podium spot were stopped by the pre-tournament favourites and eventual winners, Netherlands in the quarter-finals as they lost clearly, 2-0 (30:20, 22:16).

Their first match of the 5-8 placement round saw them take Tunisia 2025 group opponents Spain to a shoot-out, after coming from one set down to take the second (21:20). But a number of missed shots saw them lose eventually lose, 7:2. This led to a 7/8 placement game, against Norway, but the hosts could not end with a win, losing 2-0 (23:18, 29:28).

“Before this, we had not even smelt eighth place in the European Championship,” said coach Irina Miladinova after the historic ranking.

“Sometimes luck was on our side, sometimes not, but we never gave up. I can only congratulate the girls. I believed in their abilities because I saw how they gave it their all during the camp before the tournament. They really wanted to show what they had learned and they reached a historic place in the youth team.”

The provisional squad of 14 named by Miladinova features 11 of the 12 players who finished eighth in Europe last night. Simona Cherkezova did not make the Tunisia 2025 squad, while Eleonora Kireva, Tea Tsankova and Petya Vasileva join.

Key players for Bulgaria include right wing Nasya Asenova, who top-scored for Bulgaria last year (71 points), followed by left wing Stefani Stoykova (67 points). Goalkeeper Anna Kardzhilova is another crucial cog in the Bulgarian machine.

“The teams in our preliminary group are quite equal and, apart from Uruguay, for whom we have less information and observation, we know each other quite well with the remaining three teams, as we played each other during the past European Championship in Varna, Bulgaria in 2024,” added Miladinova to ihf.info. “The goal for the team that we have set for ourselves is a quota for the Youth Olympic Games.”

Bulgaria are one of six debutants in the women’s competition, along with Kenya, Mexico, Senegal, Tanzania and hosts, Tunisia.

Coach: Irina Miladinova
Key players: Nasya Asenova (Right Wing), Stefani Stoykova (Left Wing), Anna Kardzhilova (Goalkeeper)
Qualification information: Replacement for OCHF allocation (YAC 16 EURO 2024 – 8th)
History in tournament: 2017-2022: DNQ 
Group at Tunisia 2025: Group D – Croatia (CRO), Uruguay (URU), Spain (ESP), Bulgaria (BUL)