How Austria made it to the main round

With a 33:33 draw against Spain Austria made the unthinkable true. They reached the main round of the Men’s EHF EURO 2024, while the Iberians must go home after previously reaching the semi-final six times in a row and, in every previous edition, playing in the main round.

The game itself was not just in the result but also from a statistical point of view extremely close. The field and penalty shooting efficiency (Spain 65.9 per cent, Austria 67.4 per cent)  and turnover numbers (7.7 per 50 possessions, 7.8 per 50 possessions) were almost the same and while Spain had slightly better goalkeeping numbers (27.7 per cent saves, 19.5 per cent saves), they evened that out by missing the goal more often.

Good where it is needed

Overall, both teams were very efficient in offence with Spain scoring 31.7 and Austria 32.4 goals per 50 possessions; Spain even had one more possession. The 32.4 goals per 50 possessions Austria scored were their best offensive performance of the tournament and the seventh best overall.

In the previous games their offensive efficiency was rather average. Goals are adjusted to 50 possessions here, because adjusting goals (conceded) to the same number of possessions makes teams and games actually comparable since the raw number of goals is not only influenced by efficiency but also by the number of possessions (whether a team and their opponents play rather fast or slow).

Over the whole EHF EURO 2024, it is noticeable that the numbers of Ales Pajovic’s team are rather average. The only striking thing is that they have only received a handful of seven-metre penalties so far: 1.6 per 50 possessions is the lowest figure after Switzerland. Otherwise, there are no other outliers, and they are close to the average in every statistic, both in offence and defence.

But still they managed to perform where it was needed in each game. Against Spain it was the very good offensive performance, while they beat Romania thanks to a strong defensive performance where they conceded only 20.7 goals per 50 possessions, which is the eighth-best of the tournament. Against Croatia they focused on playing fast. In 33.3 per cent of their possessions, the first shot or turnover came after less than 20 seconds. Spain and Romania only managed significantly lower figures against Croatia.

Another pattern that also runs through the three games is that in each game Austria had a better field goal percentage than their opponents. In general, their shooting is very interesting.

They were successful on 64.7 per cent of their attempts from the field so far (9th place), with 7.1m being the seventh-shortest distance (apart from first-wave counterattacks). At the same time, they have the fourth smallest angles on these throws with an average angle of 58.8° to the baseline. Although they throw a lot from close positions to the goal, many of their shots are from the wings, which reduces both the angle and the probability of scoring.

Heavy load on four players

The Austrians' wing players also played a big part in this. A total of 25.7 per cent of their shot attempts come from them. Only five teams have a higher share, but just two of them made it to the main round.

Just five wingers have taken a double-digit amount of non-fastbreak shots from the field and both Robert Weber and Sebastian Frimmel are among them. In addition, they have the smallest shooting angles among these five with 29.1° and 32.9°.

Weber and Frimmel are also in the top 10 of the wings that played the most minutes in the competition (49.0 and 55.8 minutes per game). Frimmel even leads all wings, while he is second to his teammate Lukas Hutecek (57.5) in minutes played of all players. Nikola Bilyk (49.8 minutes) is their fourth player in the top 20 of minutes played. Without goalkeeper goalkeepers, he makes it into the top 10 as well.

This means that Austria’s key players have had to play an extremely high number of minutes so far. No other team is represented in the top 20 as often. Of the teams still in the tournament, only Iceland has two players in the top 20, all the others have one or none at all.

Nevertheless, of all players with at least 18 field attempts, Bilyk (64.3 per cent) and Hutecek (63.2 per cent) rank among the 10 players with the best shooting percentage. Bilyk is even the most efficient of all high-frequency shooters with at least eight attempts in the entire EHF EURO 2024.

Austria’s most efficient player with at least 15 field attempts, however, is Tobias Wagner at 66.7 per cent. Together with the Georgian Erekle Arsenashvili, he is also the line player with the most shots per game (six). In contrast to Frimmel, Weber, Hutecek and Bilyk, he gets regular breaks, especially in defence.

So, the big question is whether the four players in particular can continue to deliver under this heavy load. So far, it seems to have been no problem for them, but it will be very interesting to see in the upcoming games if they can keep up these good numbers if they continue to play this much.

But the Austrians' previous games have shown that they are able to adapt to their opponents and perform to the point. So, even if the semi-finals seem out of reach, they are definitely capable of at least one more surprise.

More from data analyst Julian Rux can be found at Handballytics.de. There you can read his latest articles, in which he analyses all kinds of handball topics from new, data-based perspectives. You can also find him on Instagram, Facebook, X/Twitter and WhatsApp Channels.

Photos © Kolektiff Images