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First Winter European Championships in history

RSV players Böhme, Brown, Mosler, Weiß and Zantinge challenged on continental stage

On Saturday, the first Wheelchair Basketball European Championships in history will start, which will be held in winter. The background is the also postponed Paralympics of Tokyo, which the European Championships in Madrid had to give way. However, the continental championships are not only about European Championship precious metal, but also about qualifying for next year’s World Championships in Dubai. In the Spanish capital, which is hosting for the second time after 1997, numerous RSV players will also be at the start.

Above all Thomas Böhme and Catharina Weiß for the German men’s and women’s selection. For the 30-year-old Böhme, the European Championship starts on Saturday with the match against newly promoted Lithuania, while the only 21-year-old Weiß and her team will have to deal with world champion and Paralympic champion Netherlands at the start on Sunday. Most recently, the German women secured European Championship bronze in Rotterdam in 2019 before finishing fourth as the second-best European team at the Tokyo Games, ahead of Great Britain and Spain in seventh and eighth place. Upon reaching the semi-finals in Madrid, the World Cup ticket would be safe and a European Championship medal for the German women’s team would be within reach.

In the men’s category, Germany took the thankless fourth place in Walbrzych, Poland, in 2019, but in the last ten years has won three of its seven European Championship medals of the last 50 years, silver in 2011 and bronze in 2015 and 2017. In Madrid, the German men’s national team has to take fifth place to secure their ticket to the 2022 World Cup but is also likely to be looking for a European Championship medal again.

But the RSV Lahn-Dill has much more to give than only the two German teams. Dominik Mosler and the Polish team are looking forward to Saturday’s opener against Switzerland, Quinten Zantinge is expecting his Dutch to face Turkey on the same day and of course Simon Brown wants to defend the 2019 European title with Great Britain. At the start, the British will also meet Israel on Saturday and have their sights firmly set on the World Cup ticket, while the road to Dubai is likely to be much more challenging for the Netherlands and Poland.

German squad men: Jens Eike Albrecht (RSB Thuringia Bulls), Joe Bestwick (Köln 99ers), Thomas Böhme (RSV Lahn-Dill), Alexander Budde (Hannover United), Matthias Güntner (Rhine River Rhinos Wiesbaden), Aliaksandr Halouski (RSB Thuringia Bulls), Jan Haller (Hannover United), Tobias Hell (Hannover United), Christopher Huber (clubless), Oliver Jantz (Hannover United), Jan Sadler (Hannover United), Phillip Schorp (BBC Münsterland).

Men’s schedule: Lithuania – Germany (Sat., 4:45 p.m.), France – Germany (Sun., 5:45 p.m.), Poland – Germany (Mon., 4:45 p.m.), Switzerland – Germany (Tue., 11:00 a.m.), Spain – Germany (Wed., 4:45 p.m.).

German squad ladies: Lisa Bergenthal (Köln 99ers), Annabel Breuer (clubless), Svenja Erni (BBU ́01 Ulm), Vanessa Erskine (Hannover United), Amanda Fanariotis (RSKV Tübingen), Vakeska Finger (Dolphins Trier), Anna-Lena Hennig (BBC Münsterland), Lena Knippelmeyer (BBC Münsterland), Katharina Lang (ING Skywheelers), Maya Lindholm (BG Baskets Hamburg), Svenja Mayer (Rhine River Rhinos Wiesbaden), Anne Patzwald (BG Baskets Hamburg), Catharina Weiß (RSV Lahn-Dill), Lena Wiemann (RSC Osnabrück).

Women’s schedule: Netherlands – Germany (Sun., 3:30 p.m.), Spain – Germany (Mon., 10:00 a.m.), Turkey – Germany (Tue., 3:30 p.m.), France – Germany (Wed., 12:15 p.m.), Great Britain – Germany (Thu., 12:15 p.m.).

Photo: By Tim Adams – Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=98688479

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