Last group match for the golden pineapple

The European Water Polo Championships 2022 in Split are just two match days old and it has come as one had to fear from the German point of view. Petar Porobic’s team is simply not competitive at this level at the moment and it is already clear that they have also missed out on the minimum goal, namely third place in the group and participation in the last 16.

After the defeats against Holland and Romania, Germany no longer has a chance of relinquishing the last place in this group. On the contrary, it could get even worse on Friday, when the German team will face the world champions from Spain, against whom they already lost 8:17 in Krefeld during the preparation.

Perhaps the German team can hope that the Spaniards will not take this match completely seriously and let the second team into the pool, because the world champions have already won their group after two victories in the first two matches and are therefore in the quarter-finals. There is no way around the fact that in the duel between Germany and Spain, a prediction of a victory for the world champions is the only alternative.

Germany – Statistics & current form

European Championships in water polo have been held since 1926 and, with a few exceptions, there has always been a German team at the start. However, it took almost 100 years to produce the historically most unsuccessful European Championship of all time from a German perspective. The worst result to date was eleventh place in 2016, and it is already clear that it will not be possible to achieve this again this year.

Negative series continues

After the match against Spain, the Germans will most probably fight with Malta, Slovenia and Slovakia for places 13-16. Teams like Georgia or Israel, on the other hand, will fare better. For the Olympic champions of 1928 and two-time European champions, this performance is an absolute indictment. The lowest point does not seem to have been reached yet.

It was clear to everyone that it would already be difficult in the preliminary round. Spain is generally unattainable and close matches were expected against Romania and the Netherlands. Unfortunately, that’s not how it turned out. Petar Porobic’s team had no chance against two teams that were supposed to be on a par. The first match against Oranje was a heavy 6:13 defeat.

It did not get any better against the Romanians on Wednesday. In the end, the German team scored just four goals of their own and lost 4:11. This means that the German men have only won two of their last ten games. If the world champions get serious again on Friday, we can imagine playing the odds on a seven to eight-goal handicap victory for the Iberians between Germany and Spain.

Predicted line-up of Germany:
Schenkel, Götz – Bozic, Korbel, Cuk, Schütze, Jüngling, Strelezkij, Küppers, Stamm, Dolff, Schipper, Gansen – Coach: Porobic

Spain – Statistics & current form

The Spanish have improved steadily in recent years. This is because the country’s best players have been drawn together in Catalonia and play predominantly in Barceloneta. Block formation is the magic word. In the daily training work, automatisms and moves can be worked out much better and so the Spaniards are currently reaping the fruits of their hard work.

Mega series of the world champion

The Iberians won their third World Cup title overall and their first in 21 years at the World Cup, which was just held in Hungary. Nevertheless, David Martin Lozano’s team is still hungry. The Iberians have never been European champions. After silver at the last two European championship tournaments, they want to win the gold medal this year.

The results in the last few months have been outstanding. Of the last 16 international matches, the Spaniards have lost only one, and that was in the World League against the runners-up from Italy. From this it can be deduced that whoever wants to become European champion has to get past the Spaniards in any case, and this also means that a prediction of a German victory between Spain and Germany is obsolete.

At the European Championship in Croatia, however, the Spaniards were not as convincing as one might have imagined up to this point. In their opening match against Romania, they won 16:9 with five goals by Alvaro Granados. But on Wednesday, the world champions had their hands full against the emerging Dutch in an 11:10 win to qualify early for the quarter-finals.

Predicted line-up of Spain:
Aguirre, Lorrio – Munarriz, Granados, Sanahuja, De Toro, Larumbe, Famera, Cabanas, Tahull, Perrone, Barroso, Bustos – Coach: Martin Lozano

Germany – Spain Direct comparison / H2H-Balance

Since 2009, the two water polo teams from Germany have crossed paths a total of 14 times in Spain. The direct comparison clearly shows that the reigning world champions are a number too big for the German team. During this period, the Spaniards won 13 of these matches, while the German water polo players only managed to prevail once.

There have been two duels between these two teams this year. In March, it was all about qualifying for the World League and even then the German team had no chance. The Spaniards won safely with 16:7. The last encounter took place last week in a final European Championship test. In Krefeld, the World Champions won again by a clear margin, 17:8.

Germany – Spain tip

The German water polo players are already licking their wounds. Even though coach Petar Porobic knows that he has a lot of work to do, he certainly had imagined the European Championships a little differently. Two defeats against the Netherlands and Romania meant certain elimination in the preliminary round. In this condition, nothing can be expected against the world champions on Friday.

But the Spaniards will have to show how hot they are for this game. There is no need to talk about taking it easy, because the world champions can skip the round of 16 and have enough time to recharge their batteries.

The only question is what handicap we go into this match with. Alternatively, you can place bets on the number of goals. It is also conceivable to place a bet on the Iberians leading after the first quarter. Because we don’t believe in a big win for the world champions, we decided to bet on a handicap win (+12.5) for the German team between Germany and Spain.