The second session of the fourth match day saw decisions made in the Main Round and Consolation Round of the 2016 IHF Beach Handball World Championships.

Men’s Competition

Main Round
Hungary made it two penalty wins in two today as they overcame Ukraine 2-1.

Hungary provided the home fans in attendance and those watching live on Hungarian TV with a tense ending, eventually beating the Brazilians 7:6 on a shootout to win the game 2-1. After another disappointing first period which they lost 22:17, they came back strong against the Ukrainians in the second period, winning 30:25 and then 9:6 in the shootout.

Ukraine, with a young team who suffered a now shock loss against USA in their opening game, have looked stronger as the tournament progressed and will be a threat in years to come but discipline issues meant that against Mykola Shnyt was disqualified.

Brazil got back to winning ways 2-0 against Spain although they were made to work in the first period, winning 23:22. Spain had Miguel Corral disqualified while the lethal pairing of Gil Perez and Nailson Amaral scored 29 goals between them.

In the big clash of the day, Croatia, after a tight first period which they won 13:12 eventually eased past Qatar 2-0 after winning the second period 25:19. Ahead of the game Qatar had looked impressive and were being talked about us Budapest 2016 winners but Croatia now seem to have taken that title.

The results meant that Spain and Ukraine are out of contention for the semi-finals as they play each other tomorrow and do not have enough points to catch Croatia, Brazil, Qatar or Hungary who play for position tomorrow.

End of day rankings:

1 – CROATIA
2 – BRAZIL
3 – QATAR
4 – HUNGARY
5 – SPAIN
6 – UKRAINE

Consolation Round
In the first round of games in the second session Australia won their second match of the day beating USA 5:4 on penalties to win 2-1, Egypt beat Uruguay on penalties 5:4 and in an impressive one-man performance, Sayed Shehab Ahmed scored 28 points for Bahrain, who had Mohamed Fardan disqualified, as they easily beat Oman 2-0.

The second round of games in the second session saw Oman beat Egypt 2-0, Uruguay claiming Pan American honours against USA 2-0 and Bahrain beating Australia easily 2-0 (41:24).

End of day rankings:

1 – OMAN
2 – EGYPT
3 – URUGUAY
4 – BAHRAIN
5 – AUSTRALIA
6 – UNITED STATES

Women’s Competition

Main Round
All three games in the second session went to penalty shootouts such is the quality of teams playing each other at this stage of Budapest 2016.

Chinese Taipei again came close to victory, but lost in their shootout with Italy 7:6, putting paid to any hopes they had of making the semi-finals in the first match of the second session. Again they had a player disqualified, this time Chiu-En Chu.

Hungary again went to penalties and again lost, this time against Brazil 8:6, again Hungary had the match top-scorer, this time it was Fruzsina Kretz with 19 points.

Norway beat Spain 5:4 on shots to win for the second time in the day in a match that was marked with a minute’s silence in memory of former Norwegian Handball Federation and European Handball President Tor Lian.

On their performance today and in the rest of the tournament, it is hard to look past Brazil as potential winners. In the final round of games tomorrow Italy need to be Norway and hope Hungary lose to Chinese Taipei. If they do, they will move into fourth place and progress through to the semi-finals.

End of day rankings:

1 – BRAZIL
2 – SPAIN
3 – NORWAY
4 – HUNGARY
5 – ITALY
6 – CHINESE TAIPEI

Consolation Round
Argentina’s women beat Poland on penalties 4:2 as they made it two wins from two, while Thailand beat Uruguay 2-0.  Australia got their second victory of the session beating Tunisia with Allira Hudson-Gofers top-scoring with 14 goals.

The second round of games in the later session saw Poland finally get a win, beating Australia 2-0, while Thailand rounded off a successful day at the office, beating Tunisia 2-0 to make it three wins from three. Tunisia had Manel Mrad disqualified.

In the final match of the day Argentina claimed Pan American honours, beating Uruguay 2-1 by penalty shots (6:4).

End of day rankings:

1 – AUSTRALIA
2 – ARGENTINA
3 – THAILAND
4 – POLAND
5 – TUNISIA
6 – URUGUAY

Full placement match schedule will be available on IHF.info after 22:00 hrs (local time) tonight (Friday 15 July).

Photo: HHF/Aniko Kovacs