Group D: Hungary beat Qatar thanks to great team effort

14 Jan. 2019

Group D: Hungary beat Qatar thanks to great team effort

Hungary - Qatar 32:26 (16:11)

Before the World Championship began, these two teams were among the biggest favorites, besides Sweden, to advance to the Main Round – but coming into this match, both teams had to deal with surprising results. Therefore, this fixture was key to secure the chances to continue to the next phase.

The first half started with a dominant Hungary team, and after three minutes Hungary led the match 3:0. After that start Qatar coach Valero Rivera felt that his team needed an early time-out. The former Spain coach changed his goalkeeper and Danijel Saric came on.   

In the following minutes, Saric made some great saves, and Hungary at the same time were receiving a two-minute suspension. Qatar were back in the game: 4:3.

The atmosphere in Royal Arena this early afternoon was great thanks to the Hungarian supporters. Most of them wearing a shirt with the Hungarian superstar Laszlo Nagy, and he did not disappoint the fans. He played well in defence and was on the scorer’s list two times in the first half.

In general, the tall players in the Hungarian defence were very difficult for Qatar to handle. Qatar struggled to get the space to shoot. The captain of Qatar, Wajdi Sinen, and line player Youssef Ali kept the team in the game by scoring seven out of Qatar’s 11 goals in the first half.

However, Qatar found themselves down by three goals for a big part of the first half. In the 17th minute, Roland Mikler showed amazing skills in goal with a double save.

In the very last minute of the first half Qatar was one man down, and Hungary took a late five-goal lead 16:11 was the score-line to the break.

The second half started at a high pace with a lot of goals for both teams. After just eight minutes Hungary led 22:18. Both teams had no problem coming through the defence and scoring goals. In minute 41, Qatar got their highest scoring player Wajdi Sinen on his third two-minute suspension and thereby received a red card. Qatar changed the goalkeeper, but Hungary continued scoring goals. Hungary also changed their goalkeeper no. 12 Márton Szekely, who saved 2 penalties. Qatar tried to keep up with Hungary, but Hungary was the stronger side and won the match 32:26.  

 

hummel Player of the Match: Mate Lekai (HUN)

 

Statements after the match:

Valero Rivera, Qatar Coach: “Congratulation with the victory. Their players were better than ours, and they played better as a team today. Tomorrow its rest-day and that will become us good. Our players are not used to play that much, in so few hours. We will try our best to reach the next round.”

Mate Lekai, Hungary: “It was a hard game as always. I think that we played very well today in both ends. We completed most of our attacks, which was very essential for this game. I think we scored 90% of our goals from the back-line. It was the key for the victory.”

Anis Zououi, Qatar: “They played better than us. We played a lot better in the second half. I think the bad performance in the first half, was a question of the hard game we played last night.”