The second matchday of Group D at the 2019 IHF Men’s Youth World Championship in North Macedonia sees Tunisia and Germany open the day, with both teams having lost their openers yesterday.

Next up, Brazil take on Iceland while Portugal and Serbia round off the days’ proceedings in the late game.

GROUP D
Feature match: Tunisia vs Germany, 16:30 local time
Boris Trajkovski Arena, Skopje

After their 33:26 opening day loss against Portugal yesterday, the German side left the court, dejected, knowing that their impressive first 15 minutes counted for little as they allowed 18 goals to be scored past them in a first half where their goalkeepers could only manage two saves.

“It was not a good game for us,” said their player Ian Weber after the loss. “We were very nervous, we have some new players in the team, but we didn’t play. We are sad, but Tunisia is a new game and a new day.”

After Portugal went on a 5:0 run towards the end of the first half, Germany were behind for the rest of the match and must do better today against a Tunisian side who lost to Iceland 25:20 yesterday.

Tunisian player Rami Fekih admitted after the loss it was not a good game for his side either and promised everyone they would see a “different” Tunisia side today.

That remains to be seen but the North African side will need to have a much improved first half performance after only managing six strikes in the first 30 minutes against their European opponents yesterday.

What is clear is that even though it is just the second game for both teams at North Macedonia 2019 it is already a crucial match.

Impressive Portugal looking to make it two from two

After defeating Germany yesterday, Portugal captain Filipe Morais told IHF.info that, as a replacement team for the Oceanian continent his side “have the talent to be here,” and that they “have to prove that this is where we should be.”

They did that in their victory over the higher-ranked 2018 M18 EHF EURO opponents Germany and they face another tough test against Serbia in the 20:30hrs evening match. Serbia beat Brazil impressively, 30:24 in their opening match so it should be an interesting clash.

The other Group D game sees the Brazilians take on Iceland, with the South Americans having had more rest after arriving on the morning of their opening game, while Iceland had no problem dispatching Tunisia in their first match.

Photo: WCH 2019 / Filip Viranovski