Egypt men's national handball team
The Egyptian national handball team is the national handball team of Egypt and is controlled by the Egyptian Handball Federation. Egypt is one of the finest handball teams from Africa along with Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Angola. Egypt has had two golden generations, one from 1991-2001 and a present one starting from 2019. The first generation was the first non-European team to reach the semifinals in the World Championships. While the current generation became the first African team to reach the semifinals in the Olympic tournament. History. Egypt's first appearance at  the IHF World Championship was in 1964, where they failed to win a game. But since they were the first African team to participate at the tournament, and the fact that non-European teams were heavily underdeveloped back then, it was considered a major achievement. After Egypt started developing their handball infrastructure, Egypt were able to qualify for the 1993 tournament at Sweden. They were able to win a game this time, against Czechoslovakia and were able to progress to the next round with this one win. In the second round, however, despite close matches against all three opponents – Romania , France and Switzerland (going as far as 26–27 with Romania) – Egypt failed to progress to the next stage. Egypt's performance at the 1995 Championship is what raised Egypt to a respectable team. This time, Egypt won three matches at the first round, beating Brazil, Kuwait and Belarus. The team was widely expected not to survive the knockout stage, but surprised the world by beating former World Champions Romania in the round of 16. While they were later beaten at the quarterfinals against Croatia, the team was highly praised back home. Handball continued to grow at Egypt and a rivalry  formed between Egypt and Tunisia. Egypt advanced to the quarterfinals every time between 1995 and 2001, arguably the golden age of Egyptian Handball. They also reached 6th place at the 1996 Olympics and 7th at 2000, their best Olympic placements. Egypt hosted the World Championship in 1999 for the first time, failing to reach the semi-finals after a loss against Russia. In the 2001 IHF World Championship, Egypt beat Morocco, Portugal and Iceland, drew with Czechia and lost to Sweden. At the knockout stage, Egypt beat fellow Africans, Algeria. At the quarterfinals, where Egypt has been knocked out three  times prior, Egypt faced Russia again, having their revenge after winning the close game 21–19. Egypt then became the first non-European team to reach the semi-finals. After losses against France and Yugoslavia, Egypt placed fourth. This was the best performance by a non-European team until it was equaled by Tunisia at 2005 and beaten by Qatar in 2015. Between 2003 and 2017, Egypt qualified to every tournament save for the 2012 Olympics, but failed to impress, never advancing to the quarterfinals any time. Egypt broke this streak at the 2019 World Championship, where they placed eighth. Egypt  then went on to host the first 32-team Handball Championship in 2021, finishing seventh after losing to reigning Olympic and World Champions, Denmark on penalties, who later won the tournament. Egypt beat their rivals Tunisia in their own court, qualifying to the 2020 Olympics. They ended up fourth, being the first African team to ever play in the semifinals. They placed second in the group stage, after beating Portugal, Sweden, Bahrain and Japan, only losing to World Champions Denmark once again. They then made a surprisingly comfortable win against Germany in the quarterfinals, qualifying to the top 4. They  then lost to France by a 4-goal margin, despite having had a 4-goal lead early on. They then lost a close game against Spain in the Bronze Medal match, placing 4th, their best performance at the Olympics. Competitive record. Champions   Runners-up   Third place   Fourth place Team. Current squad. Squad for the 2021 World Men's Handball Championship. Head coach: Roberto García Parrondo