Everybody knew that Henny Reistad was special. Since making her debut in the Norway women’s senior national team in 2018, when she was only 19 years old, the left back has always been one of the players to watch.

At her maiden edition of the IHF Women’s World Championship, Spain 2021, Reistad was named in the All-Star team and placed 10th on the top scorer list, with 38 goals. One year later, she helped Norway seal another gold medal, at the EHF EURO 2022, where she was named the MVP of the competition.

Add that to her MVP title in the EHF FINAL4 in 2021, and you probably get the picture. The left back is something special, having won every competition she played in for club and country, apart from the Olympic Games, coming third at Tokyo 2020. But now, Reistad has her own signature match, which will probably stay with her forever.

Until the semi-final against Denmark at the 2023 IHF Women’s World Championship, the left back has had an on-and-off competition, scoring 32 goals from 47 shots. She was not even in the top 10 scorers in the competition. Yet she pulled an outstanding match out of her hat, writing history in the progress.

Norway have clinched every title there is to clinch and secured some huge wins in the process. But never has a player scored 15 goals in one match at the IHF Women’s World Championship, with the record being set at 14 goals by Kjersti Grini, at Denmark/Norway 1999, against Australia.

This time around, though, it was not a 38:11 win in the preliminary round, this was a semi-final of the IHF Women’s World Championship, a high-pressure match, with over 12,000 fans in the stands, with a winner-takes-all scenario. And then there was Reistad.

From the 47 goals she scored so far in eight appearances at the 2023 IHF Women’s World Championship, 15 were scored against Denmark, in the 29:28 extra-time win. Basically, Team Esbjerg’s left back scored more than half of Norway’s goals. And all six scored in extra-time, including the buzzer-beater which sealed the win.

It might not have been the best performance by a single player at the IHF Women's World Championship - North Macedonia's Natalija Todorovska still holds that record, with 21 goals scored against Cameroon at Russia 2005 - but it was still one of the highest-impact individual performances in the history of the competition.

“It means an incredible amount. It is impressive from the team that we are still standing here in the end,” said Reistad at the end of the match against Denmark, a semi-final which will definitely go as a vintage match.

“I think this is one of the best matches I have ever played and I am over the moon with the result,” added the 24-year-old left back.

Sure enough, a 15-goal performance in a deciding clash is a monster of an achievement. It goes without saying that the context is even more impressive. Reistad, who plays at Team Esbjerg at club level, faced her own coach, Jesper Jensen, who is coaching both the Danish club and the Denmark women’s national team.
Basically, in his day-to-day job, Jensen is responsible to design plays to put Reistad in the best possible position of scoring and the Norwegian back answered with a 142-goals performance last season in the EHF Champions League Women.

However, on Friday, Jensen could not prevent Reistad from shining, in spite of having one of the greatest defences in the competition at his disposal.

“We can all be inspired off and hopefully a lot of kids watched this match and got inspired from this. We provided a fantastic match,” said Jensen, at the end of Denmark’s loss against Norway.

Yet Reistad still has something on her mind. On Sunday, 48 hours after scoring the last-gasp goal against Denmark, she will be on the court once again facing France, in a rematch of the Spain 2021 final, when she secured her first gold medal at the IHF Women’s World Championship.

Two years ago, she was the top scorer of that game, with six goals, in another masterclass of a comeback, which saw Norway erase a four-goal deficit at the break, to lift their fifth title at the IHF Women’s World Championship.

And she might have revenge on her mind, after scoring only three times in the 23:24 loss against France at the end of the main round in Trondheim, the only loss conceded by the Scandinavian side on their way to the final.

One thing is sure, though: if Norway are to win back-to-back titles and crown themselves queen of the world for the sixth time, Reistad will be the go-to player for Norway, especially in such a form.