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nised and accepted owing to its superior
quality. “The courses were quite tough and
the Master paper quite a challenge. I was
one of the youngest candidates, alongside
well-known names such as Dagur Sigurdsson,
Bob Hanning, Klaus-Dieter Petersen
and Christian Schwarzer, who also
completed the Master Coach programme,”
said Spaniard Raul Alonso, coach of Austrian
national league club Schwaz Tirol, after
he had been awarded his certificate. “I
learned a lot that will prove useful. Group
dynamics and the exchange of experiences
were excellent and have provided me
with fresh ideas.” In the future, all coaches
having responsibility for teams entering
European competitions will be required
to hold an EHF Master Coach License.
In the late 1990s, the EHF defined coach
and referee training programmes for
young people as an additional new priority.
The 1st EHF Youth Coaches’ Course
was conducted at Partille/SWE on 27
and 28 June 1998, on the fringe of the
renowned youth tournament held near
Gothenburg. Further courses followed in
Estoril (POR) and Rotenburg (GER) in 1999.
From an early date on, the EHF’s aim has
been to also provide training for referees
at a high level – and, as history has shown,
quite successfully.
Among the participants of the 1st Young
Referees Course, likewise held in Partille
from 1 to 6 June 2000, were the young pairs
Horacek/Nowotny (CZE), Gjeding/Hansen
(DEN) and Lazar/Reveret (FRA). These
three pairs went on to officiate at many
major matches, and some of them still do.
And this is exactly what the EHF had in mind
when it initiated the Young Referee Project
in 2001. EHF President Staffan Holmqvist
said: “Within this project we will establish
a new generation of referees, well-educated
and with international experience at a
young age. They are ready for greater challenges!”
Another of the EHF’s core tasks in the development
of handball is the promotion of
women’s handball. This topic was on the
agenda already back in the mid-1990s, at
the 3rd EHF Congress in Athens, for example.
Further initiatives were the Women’s
Action Plan in 1999, the installation of a
system with “women coordinators” and
a Women’s Handball Day in 2000, when
the EHF was proactively recruiting female
members, asking them to take part as
coach, as player or as delegate or functionary.
“The European Handball Federation
is convinced that it is important to make
handball more accessible for women and
to help them to overcome regional and
cultural barriers,” (EHF Annual Report
2000).
Five years ago, the EHF re-launched this
promotional effort by creating the Women’s
Handball Development Programme.
On the fringe of the Women’s 19 European
Championship 2011 in Rotterdam; a group
of experts around the renowned coach Marit
Breivik (NOR), including Narcisa Lecusanu
(ROU), Linde Panis (BEL), Carmen Manchado
(ESP) and Katrine Thoe Nielsen (DEN),
compiled a list of requests, which Carmen
Manchado finally presented at the 10th
Conference of Presidents. The key items
were:
• The introduction of a Women’s Handball
Board
• Measures for more female representatives
in European handball
• A full time position dedicated to
women’s handball at the European
level
• Branding of women’s handball at the
European level
• The restructuring of competitions for
young female players
• Recruitment projects for girls and
studies on ball size
The success of this initiative can be seen
today in each Annual Report of the EHF.
The Women’s Handball Board has meanwhile
been created on an equal footing with
the Men’s Professional Handball Board, but
focuses strongly on the development of
women‘s Handball and of “Women in
Handball”.
In addition to numerous initiatives started
by national federations at the external
and internal levels, one of the major champions
of this process was Jean Brihault in
his then function as Vice President. He not
only designed the structure of the Professional
Handball Board, but also presented
a plan for the Women‘s Handball
Board at the Congress. Meanwhile, women
are represented in almost every Commission.
Within the EHF administration,
the share of female members has always
been quite large.
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