Croatia’s Malenicic: “It’s another level”

Coming to the 2024 IHF Men’s Beach Handball World Championship as title-holders and The World Games champions, Croatia are one of the teams standing in the way on the Pingtan sand if any of their competitors want to take gold.

With a squad full of household names in the Beach Handball world, including Ivan Juric, Lucian Bura and Ivan Dumencic, it is no surprise that they are one of the favourites to win the global title.

However, one quick look at Croatia’s pre-event squad list shows the name of goalkeeper Stipe Malenicic, with just three national team appearances to his name – compared to Juric’s 190, Bura’s 76 and Dumencic’s 109.

IHF.info caught up with the 24-year-old shotstopper after his side made it three wins from three in the preliminary round, to take a maximum four points into the main round starting on Thursday.

IHF.info: How did you get started with the national team?

Stipe Malenicic: To be honest, I wasn't very regular in the Croatian beach tournaments, in the championships, but over the last two years I became more and more active.

Last year, the coach and the staff from the national team and me talked to each other at one of the tournaments. They asked me if I was interested in playing for Croatia and I was happy – who isn’t happy to have the opportunity to represent his own country?

After this talk, I got a phone call and was added to a WhatsApp group chat so, basically, that's how it started. I then made my debut at the IHF Beach Handball Global Tour in Poland in July, 2023.

IHF.info: What was it like joining the team for the first time, with all those medal-laden, award-winning players?

Stipe Malenicic: I'm probably the only one in the team from the southern part of Croatia, Dalmatia. All the others are from the upper part of Croatia, so there was a lot of Hajduk Split-Dinamo Zagreb football jokes, we were just teasing each other with football jokes.

But it was new, another level – it was international level. It's just another level with elite players like this. It was at first strange but now I'm managing to get into it. 

The main difference is when you play with guys like these, they're all at the top level of this sport. So, when you’re in goal, sometimes you don't even know how they manage to do something. Bura, Jura (Juric); sometimes do some stuff (with the ball) that I don't know how they do it, strange stuff, but I'm getting into it with them. 

IHF.info: What feeling do you get when you see the Croatian flag at venues, see the logo on your playing shirt and realise you are representing your country?

Stipe Malenicic: How would I say it? Butterflies in the stomach? Goose bumps? That's the main thing. My family and friends are all supportive too. They're always joking about stuff but this morning they all woke up in 3am, 3:30am to watch the game. I asked them ‘are you normal?’ I would never wake up to watch someone at 3am, but they all did it.

IHF.info: You have many key players in the Croatia team, but none more important than your captain, Ivan Juric. What is he like to be in a team with?

Stipe Malenicic: He just doesn't want to give up. He's like 37-years-old but plays like he is 20. He always wants more and more and more. He always wants more goals, more goal difference and that's probably the main reason [he’s so important]: he just wants to beat everyone with a higher difference.

IHF.info: You have had a perfect record at China 2024 so far: three 2-0 wins. What is the feeling amongst the team going into the next stage?

Stipe Malenicic: It's nice. We had our third victory in a row and opened this competition as we wanted, so that's fine. We're heading towards the second round, towards the second group and we hope to do the same and have the same exact success over there, going through to the quarter-finals in first place.

We believe we can go all the way, but we also want to go one game at a time. We all know what the main goal is – gold – that's our feeling, that we are able to do it and I hope we will at the end.

IHF.info: In Beach Handball, you only hear the national anthems at the end when there are medals to play for…

Stipe Malenicic: I hope to hear it here in China. The main goal is to hear it.