What is handball?
Handball is a fast paced dynamic team sport game. Combining speed, strength, stamina, agility, technical precision, skill and teamwork, handball has become one of the fastest-paced and exciting Olympic sports. Teams of 7 players (including a goalkeeper) battle it out across 2 halves of 30 minutes to score the most goals. Players used their hands to pass, dribble or hit the ball, with the aim to create a shooting opportunity.
Handball combines elements of football, basketball and netball, and is hugely popular across the world. Professional clubs across Europe and the World compete in different leagues much the same as the football leagues.
For a quick guide to the sport, watch the IOC's video on the sport here
About The British Handball Association
The British Handball Association is the governing body for high performance international handball in the UK. It is responsible for the Great Britain national teams at all age groups, as well as elite coaching.
The British Handball Association was founded in 1967 and became a member of the International Handball Federation in 1968. It was also one of the original members of the European Handball Federation when it was created in 1991.
The England Handball Associations and Scottish Handball Associations are the BHA’s sole members, and are responsible for the grassroots development of the sport, as well as national and regional league and cup competitions, in their respective areas.
What we do
British Handball currently funds the indoor version of handball as the only handball discipline currently in the Olympics.
Other formats of handball include beach handball and wheelchair handball, and are played both domestically and internationally.
National Team Programmes - training and competition
Training
All national team programmes run on a camp basis for training. In advance, weekends or where possible longer periods are identified throughout the season (these are based around EHF international release dates and other national leagues) for squad members to come together for intensive training sessions. The training dates will be communicated through the appropriate team manager. Requirements for training and objectives for the sessions will be communicated. Training will generally consist of handball specific work, strength and conditioning (S&C) gym our court base work, Physio rehab or reactive treatment.
Where possible, the coaches aim is to gain as much international exposure as possible, so when opportunities come to train and compete against international opposition, we would consider this priority.
Competitions
Our age group squads currently compete in EHF Championships, the tier below the Europeans. This competition runs consecutively for men and women, across the two age groups respectively. For example, in 2022, M20 and M18 competed. In 2023 W19 and W17 will compete.
The IHF also run biennial IHF Trophy competitions for M18/M20 (even years) and W17/W19 (odd years), usually during October/November.
The senior squads' main events are the Euro and World Championship qualifiers, which are traditionally played in November for the women, and January for the men.
The men’s team also compete in the biennial IHF Emerging Nations Championship (effectively a ‘B’ World Championship), usually played in June of odd years. We are hoping that the IHF will begin a women’s Emerging Nations Championship in 2024.
In addition to the above official competitions, the GB teams also participate in friendly tournaments and matches every season.
