The qualification tournament for Women’s U20 World Championship which supposed to be organized in Serbia – is canceled by decision of Serbian authorities who didn’t let their team to play against Kosovo’s team, the territory which is unrecognized by Serbian people after war in 1999.
EHF previously decided that the whole tournament has to be played withouth national anthems and flags in Kragujevac, but that caused a lot of public critics in Serbia, which put pressure on Serbian Handball Federation to relocate tournament to Kovilovo, sports center near Belgrade, where media and fans weren’t allowed to attend matches.
However, everything resulted with protest of the Serbian fans an evening before the tournament start, who gathered close to Kovilovo sports center surrounded with strong police forces.
These were the reasons why Police decided to abandon match of Serbia and Kosovo few hours before the match, afterward Serbian girls were disqualified from U20 tournament. Moreover, authorities didn’t allow that girls from Kosovo play any matches, so tournament, on which also played Norway and Slovakia 32:23, was practically over on Friday.
What will be the final decision of European Handball Federation considering the specific sports-political topic, it is early to say.
