Germany beat Hungary for maiden W16 European Open title

Co-organised by the EHF and the Swedish Handball Federation, the European Open is held annually as part of the Partille Cup, a traditional youth handball festival in Sweden's capital, and alternates between a women's 16 and a men's 18 event.

Women's 16 European Open 2026

• Germany were in command of the final against Hungary from the get-go, taking an early 3:0 advantage and remaining in the lead throughout until the final buzzer
• however, the difference after 20 minutes was only one goal (7:6), before a 6:1 run opened a substantial gap for Germany that Hungary failed to close
• the result marked Germany's first title in this competition; Hungary lifted the trophy once, in 2018
• Germany's Nika Lemke and Taya Nagel with five goals each were the leading scorers in the final; remarkably, 11 different players made it onto the scoresheet for Germany, and even 12 for Hungary

• neither finalist had reached the gold medal match unbeaten: in the group phase, Germany were defeated by title holders Switzerland (18:17), and Hungary lost to Croatia (18:17) and dropped a point against Czechia (17:17)
• both teams then eased through the quarter-finals, where Germany beat Spain 22:16 and Hungary outscored France 35:25
• in their semi-final, Germany used a superb second half to beat Croatia 35:18 from 19:15 at half-time, allowing their opponents just three goals in the second half
• in a semi-final between two former European Open champions, Hungary edged out Switzerland 32:28 after overtime, led by Hungary right back Hannah Molnár with 10 goals and Switzerland centre back Nina Hasler with 12
• Croatia took the bronze medal with a close 24:23 win over Switzerland after centre back Ena Gotal, who netted 13 times in total, scored Croatia's winning goal in the last minute
• the tournament top scorer was centre back Denisa-Elena Filip from seventh-placed Romania, with 59 goals
• as the top two teams of the European Open 2026, Germany and Hungary qualified for the inaugural edition of the IHF Women's U16 World Championship in Agadir, Morocco in October

Second-half power helps Germany lift the trophy

"Give me a break!" must have been Germany's motto at the W16 European Open. The eventual champions won most of their seven matches based on strong second-half performances. Germany scored 193 goals in total, and 102 of them came after the break of their respective matches.

The only exception was their semi-final against Croatia (35:18), when they netted 19 times before half-time (19:15) and added 'only' 16 goals after the break. However, Germany showed defensive power in that second half, conceding just three more goals in those 30 minutes. Which, ultimately, underlined the old adage in handball: defence wins tournaments.

main image © Gunilla Mattsson