Betting on an Olympic women’s handball final between Russia and Norway wouldn’t have given great odds. In fact, these two teams dominated the major tournaments in the last years.

 

The same was true about Beijing, where Norway won their first ever Olympic gold medal after two silver medals in 1988 and 1992.

 

The result in the final was 34:27 for the he team of coach Marit Breivik that cut through the whole tournament like a hot knife through butter. The Norwegians only had some difficulties with South Korea in the semi-final where they won 29:28 with the decisive goal coming from World Player of the Year, Gro Hammerseng, in the final second.

 

Korea among the best teams

 

And Korea – as usual – were the only team to break the European dominance at the tournament. After losing the semi-final against Norway, Korea snatched the Bronze medal from the girls of Hungary (33:28).

 

Six out of seven European teams qualified for the quarterfinals – only Germany were unlucky by losing three matches with one goal each, always in the very last seconds, and finished the tournament 11th.

 

Due to the six European teams meeting in the quarterfinals. Romania – after a very strong preliminary round, close to a victory against Norway – were eliminated by Hungary.

 

Russia needed two extra times to get over France leading several times with five goals during the game. And in the “Northern duel” Norway managed to easily eliminate Sweden.

 

After the placement matches, Romania ranked seventh before Sweden; France became fifth by beating host country China.

 

After Norway made their way to the final, Russia played a very strong first halftime against Hungary in the second semi-final, but the final result (22:20) shows a tougher game than it actually was.

 

Norway unstoppable

 

But then in the final, Norway gave handball lesson for free to Russia. The lesson was about very effective, top speed handball.

 

After 15 minutes the match was decided as Norway were leading 13:3. Every Russian attacking mistake was punished by counter attacks. Even as Russia came closer to a five goal difference, Norway changed into the next gear to overrun the reigning world champion (Russia won the final in 2007 after losing the EURO 2006 final against Norway).

 

European top players

 

Norway were the only team in the whole Olympic tournament (men and women) to win all eight matches. Accordingly, two Norwegian players (Lunde, Soerlie-Lybekk) were nominated for the All-star team. Two Russian (Bliznova, Postnova) and one Romanian (Maier) and Hungarian (Vérten) player in the dream team meant that six out of seven were European players. The Korea playmaker Oh was the only non-European there.