Local side Khaleej enjoyed their first victory of the 2023 IHF Men’s Super Globe on Wednesday when they faced University of Queensland in their second match of the group phase, thereby concluding their campaign in that stage. In the three-team group, Khaleej had played EHF Champions League and defending Super Globe title holders SC Magdeburg on the opening day, recording a 20:29 defeat to the German team.

The two points from the win against UQ placed Khaleej second in the group, from where they proceed to the placement round for positions five to eight. Playing the Super Globe debutants who are gaining their first experience on the international stage, Khaleej took a comfortable win, 48:26. 

“It’s very good for us after the loss of yesterday. We tried to focus more, to make the people who came happy today,” said Khaleej’s Egyptian line player Mohammed Mamdouh Shebib. 

“We lost against the European champions, the world champions — it’s normal. Maybe it could have been better, the result, but we made a mistake and we take a responsibility for it. So now we had to take step two, which was the match of today. We finished it and we have another step.” 

Although it was a good fight from UQ, Khaleej could see the win on the horizon with a clear lead of 26:12 at half-time. 

“We respect everyone. Today it was a new team, a beginning team, and we have respected them from the beginning until the end. This is the most important thing for us and we take it to have more confidence in ourselves,” said Mamdouh Shebib. 

As a club based in Dammam, Khaleej have had a full arena of support for their matches at the 2023 IHF Men’s Super Globe. 2023 is their second appearance in the competition after their sixth place on debut in 2022, but Shebib Mamdouh is a new arrival at Khaleej, having been playing with Romanian team Dinamo Bucuresti from 2019 to the end of the 2022/23 season. Prior to that, the Egyptian line player was at Montpellier HB in France for two seasons, winning the EHF Champions League with the side in 2018. His playing origins in Egypt were with Zamalek. 

Now with Khaleej after years spent in Europe, the cultural setting is a little more like home for Shebib Mamdouh. 

“I really love them so much. I didn’t play for a long time in this atmosphere,” said Shebib Mamdouh about the crowd providing the atmosphere at the Super Globe matches. 

“My father was a player here, 40 years ago, so I know very well how the spectators are here. I’m so thankful for them because really they give us more motivation. We were sad about yesterday [versus Magdeburg] that we just disappointed them, but what’s coming next is so important for us and we will try to do our best to make them happy.”