“Wind of change” in the world of handball? The European Handball Federation sent an open letter to all the national Federations and TOP teams with the aim to give feedback about possible changes of the rules of handball game instructed by IHF. The International Handball Federation began with the process of evaluation in which opinion of the most successful continent will have a certain value.
“The International Handball Federation, based on an IHF Congress decision in 2015 introduced the new and currently valid IHF Rules of the Game on 1 July 2016 targeting the speeding up of the
game, and by that, increasing the interest for handball for the spectators in the halls as well as for the audience via TV and electronic media. In autumn of last year, the International Handball Federation started a process of evaluating these rules, and especially the consequences of the new rules for optimising their interpretation, but as well shaping the further development of the rules for the years to come.
The EHF has been invited to partake in an expert panel for this purpose and there will be a meeting session on 29/30 March 2019 with the participation of EHF CC Member Refereeing, Dragan Nachevski, and the responsible for Education and further Education in the EHF office, Helmut Höritsch.
We therefore ask all of you, the National Federations as well as the Men’s and Women’s top clubs in Europe, to send your input, your proposals, your ideas to the EHF regarding the existing rules
and their interpretations as well as possible amendments to these existing rules in the future or even input to new rules.
Your input will be very valuable for the EHF and will be collected in order to have a better knowledge of common points of view and common understandings regarding certain rules. This collected input will then be passed on and presented to the mentioned meeting at the end of March by the participating EHF Representatives”, writes in the open letter.
PHOTO: Mandatory Credit ©SEHA/ Uros Hocevar
Guillaume Camensuli
2. March 2019. at 06:22
I have to disagree with counting fouls. In my opinion, that’s what make handball very good to watch ; it’s a contact sport, closer to rugby than basketball. Contact make defensive game very entertaining in my opinion. You’re not only waiting for the attack team to do something ; you want to see them being crushed by defense. I think it’s part of identity of handball and I’d like rules to be changed to see more of that.
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Avraham Seifert
28. February 2019. at 11:26
Handball has to change it is clear.
1) Start counting fouls (6-8 and out you go). Audience does not come to see guys hugging each other forcefully. Nor do they come to see shirts being torn, nor players pushed in mid air. Make a defender pay for fouls. Audience come to see nice goals, athletic players that do not fear being injured by those who can not jump because they are 30-50 kg overweight.
2) Add offence clock (25-35 sec). Today “passive game” is poorly defined.
3) Limit offensive fouls only to between 6-9 m lines. Defender waiting for the players on fast break looking back to the ball thrown to then causes injuries.
4) Solve the unclear difference between offensive foul and 7 m penalty call. Technology can help identify if the defender was in the 6 m zone while there was initial contact. But even then it is still ill defined. Perhaps the defender MUST be flown back by the attacker to deserve offensive. The most difficult calls to make today.
5) Any shot to the face of the goal keeper is 7 m shot on the other side (or a red card).
6) Any foul deserving 2 min suspension in the last minute of the game is punished by 7 m throw.