Sports flash
Ștefan Baciu, 17.11.2022, 11:42
Romanian national women’s handball team in Skopje on Wednesday sustained a 32-28 defeat by Germany. The game was Romania’s last fixture as part of main group 2 and the last confrontation of the EHF EURO 2022, jointly hosted by Slovenia, North Macedonia de Nord and Montenegro. The defeat in the match against Montenegro took its toll on the Romanian lineup’s morale, so the team put on a lackluster game, in a no-stake confrontation. According to the EHF EURO 2022 final rankings, Romania will be 11th or 12th placed. In the first part of the group stage, Romania sustained a 28-29 defeat by the Netherlands, another defeat, by France, 21-32, then they grabbed a 31-23 win against North Macedonia. In the second part of the group stage, Romania was defeated by Montenegro by the narrowest of margins, 34-35 and sustained the recent defeat by Germany.
It was the Romanian national delegation’s 14th participation in a final tournament of the European Championship. At the 2020 edition, Romania came in 12th, a record-low, disheartening position for our national squad. Romania’s peak performance occurred in 2010, when the team walked away with bronze.
The match against Montenegro was crucial for both teams, in their bid to advance to the competition’s semi-finals. Romania was defeated by the narrowest of margins, which prompted the Romanian officials and the team members to take a broadside at the quality of the refereeing of the Austrian crew, made of Ana Vranes and Marlis Wenninger. The President of the Romanian Handball Federation, Constantin Din, announced they would submit a memorandum to the European Handball Federation. Among other things, Constantin Din said that the official memorandum would highlight the fact that the Romanian delegation deserved a lot more respect, and a lot more professionalism was required from the referees, who need to stick to the quality standards imposed by that competitional level. Mr Din also emphasized the quality of the refereeing did not measure up to the standards of a European Championship.
Romanian team leader, Cristina Neagu, stated that the referees should not have had the right to do the job. Neagu highlighted the fact that her team was simply denied the capacity to play with the refereeing decisions taken during the match. Cristina Neagu also said she thought the referees were unaware of what actually happened during the game, pointing to the fact that the referees simply did not know what they were refereeing. Cristina voiced hope that the referees would opt for watching the game and become aware of their own mistakes.
After the recently-held edition of the EHF EURO 2022, with 303 goals scored, Cristina Neagu has become an all-time top scorer for both the women’s and the men’s editions of the European Championships. Cristina thus toppled the previous top scorer, Icelandic handballer Gudjón Valur Sigurdsson, with his 288 goals.
Romania’s national football team has failed to qualify to the World Championship’s final tournament in Qatar. The team will play two friendly games, against Slovenia, on Thursday, November 17, in Cluj, and another match on Sunday, November 20, against the Republic of Moldova. The latter fixture will be hosted by the Zimbru Stadium in Chisinau.
The Romanian tennis player Elizabeta Samara has been elected a member of the Athletes’ Commission as part of the International Table Tennis Federation. Of the 25 candidates, 33-year-old Samara got the biggest number of votes in favor, 212, accounting for 74.91% of the total number of votes. Samara would therefore have a four-year term in office. According to a post by the International Table Tennis Federation, taking part in the voting process were 283 athletes worldwide, over November 7 and 13. (EN)
