Qatar's left wing Murad Abdulrazzaq (Second left) jumps to shoot at the goal during their 25th IHF Men's World Championship 2017 Group D handball match against Sweden at the AccorHotels Arena in Paris on Wednesday. Sweden won 36-25.
Qatar will be looking to boost their confidence ahead of the Eighth Finals by putting a strong fight against Group D leaders Denmark in their last match of preliminary stage of the 25th IHF Men’s World Championship in Paris today.
It wasn’t an impressive entry for the surprise 2015 runners-up in the knock-out stage as they lost to Sweden 36-25 in their fourth match and only advanced after Bahrain and Argentina suffered their fourth consecutive defeats on Wednesday, to crash of the 24-team competition.
Qatar entered the last 16 stage as the fourth team from Group D after their loss to the Swedes with Denmark, Sweden and Egypt filling the top three slots respectively.
It was the first time that Qatar and Sweden met on court and the game was even in the first five minutes with both the teams scoring three points each.
But Sweden gained pace and took the 9:6 lead midway to the first half and went on to the stretch the lead to seven points to go into the final session with a 19:12 lead.
Qatar goalkeeper Danijel Saric who starred in victory over Argentina was not at his best as he recorded only two saves by the 28th minute before he was changed for Yousuf Al Abdulla, who had spent less than five minutes on court prior to that moment.
Qatar failed to contain the Swedes who took control of the second half also and continue to score at regular intervals for a commanding victory.
“They (Sweden) gave us a handball lesson,” Qatar’s Bertrand Roine said after the match.
“The Swedish really played perfectly to beat our defence, with some outstanding passing and shooting. This Swedish team is really a good one.”
However, Roine hoped that his side will bounce back against Denmark in order to go into the next stage.
“We must learn from this defeat if we want to win against Denmark. We will have to move the ball more, carry the ball less and not to reproduce the mistakes we made [against Sweden], with some shots taken in uncomfortable positions and a lot of goals conceded on fast breaks,” he said.
Denmark are going against Qatar as an undefeated side, winning all their four matches they have played so far against Bahrain, Argentina, Egypt and Sweden.
The Eighth Finals will be played on Saturday and Sunday while the quarter-finals are slated to be held on January 24. Hosts France are defending their title which they won after defeating Qatar in the 2015 edition.
