DHB Cup final : THW Kiel celebrates with Alfred Gislason in the sixth title

It does not take five minutes, then he is to be seen on Sunday afternoon for the first Time: the typical Alfred Gislason. Upper body slightly backward leaning, arms in the pockets of the Jeans buried, the lips slightly pressed together, always in contact, and eye contact seeking with the referees. Gislason, coach of THW Kiel, the gesture in his career, so often performed, that it could pour easily in Bronze – even if the Icelanders model. It is a gesture that you will remember. Just like Gislason.

you May make your Alfred, one day, Yes really a Statue in front of the Handball hall in Kiel. Deserved it could have been the success coach for more than a decade, the North German tradition club from all and the occasion at the end of this season: after a total of 14 titles with the THW – six Championships, six Cup victories and two in the Champions League since 2008 – completed the 59-Year-old his career in the summer. And since Sunday, since the final of the DHB Cup in 2019 against SC Magdeburg, is clear: it could actually be a perfect outlet for Gislason, a finish with three titles.

of The DHB-Cup in the in Kiel after their 28:24 (14:13)-victory against the SCM is not to take anyway, in the EHF-Cup, you are considered to be the top Favourite, especially as the final tournament of the European Cup in may, in the schleswig-Holstein state capital. And even in the Bundesliga, the train is not worn in now four points behind League leaders Flensburg. "In a few weeks. Enough with the Endless rhythm, enough with the endless video look,“ says Gislason. After 40 years as a basketball Pro and coach of the studied historian, and his wife has promised not later than the 60. To enter a birthday in September will be shorter. "Even my wife is happy," he says and grins.

Gislason was, at that time as a pioneer of video Analytics

After the semi-final victory against the foxes, the winning the final against his Ex-club from Magdeburg was Gislason's something like the end of a parable, which began around the turn of the Millennium. At that time, the SCM undertook the largely unknown young coach, the title of the club's history and soon after made a first Champions League title of a German club led the Magdeburg for the first and to date only German mostly. Gislason was, at that time as a pioneer of video analysis in a time of cuts were not yet digital, and omnipresent, but VHS tapes to the latest state of the art. This grimness, this obsession with details, so tell gislason's friends and companions, he has kept until today.

keel Rune Dahmke (l) and Kiel's Domagoj Duvnjak celebrate a hit.Photo: dpa

in 2008, Gislason finally went to Kiel and coined perhaps the most successful Phase in of the of successful phases, not just poor history of record holders and Cup winners. I will never forget the time the national as well as international competition rolled over in 2011/12, of the of Kiel: at the end of a Bundesliga season with 68:0 (!) Points, the DHB Cup and how should it be otherwise – also, of course, the Triumph in the Champions League.

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Christoph roof

As the great Kiel team dissolved slowly, stand Gislason in front of his biggest challenge as a coach. Often, the strict Coach had to for the criticism, just with the finished teams work, and to neglect the development of young players. The criticism of his Person that came even from the closest of Kiel environment, went to him at that time pretty close. Four years without the title does not correspond to the self-understanding of the success-drenched Kiel. At the latest by the new Cup victory, achieved with a young, Gislason put together and developed team,, he punished his critics are lying.