Game plan of the 2025 handball World Cup: Overview of the semi -finals

The one has been running since January 14th HandballWorld Championship 2025 in Croatia, Denmark and Norway. It is the first time that a World Cup takes place in three countries. 32 teams take part in the tournament, which ends on February 2 with the final in the Norwegian capital Oslo.

In addition to our schedule, you will also find all tables, appointments and results for the 2025 handball World Cup in our data center.

An overview of the World Cup final round

Quarterfinals

• 01/28/2025 in Zagreb: Croatia – Hungary 31:30
• 01/28/2025 in Zagreb: France – Egypt 34:33
• 01/29/2025 in Oslo: Denmark – Brazil 33:21
• 29.01.2025 in Oslo: Portugal – Deutschland 31:30

Semi -finals

• 01/30/2025 at 9:00 p.m. in Zagreb: France – Croatia
• 01/31/2025 at 8:30 p.m. in Oslo: Denmark – Portugal

Finale

• 02.02.2025 at 6:00 p.m. in Oslo: Winner HF1 – winner HF2

The DHB team at the Handball World Cup

The German national team met Poland, Switzerland and the Czech Republic in the preliminary round and was able to win all games after start -up difficulties at the start of the game. In the first main round game against world champion Denmark there was a clear defeat, so there was a final against the surprise team from Italy a final around the quarter-finals, which the DHB team was able to win clearly in the end. In the quarter -finals, the national team finally failed due to the surprise team from Portugal.

Game plan of the 2025 handball World Cup

The World Cup main groups at a glance

• Group I in Herning: Denmark, DeutschlandItaly, Switzerland, Czech Republic, Tunisia
• Group II in Varaždin: France, Qatar, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Austria, Hungary
• Group III in Oslo: Brazil, Chile, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, Spain
• Group IV in Zagreb: Egypt, Argentina, Cape Verde Islands, Croatia, Iceland, Slovenia

The German World Cup squad

For the Handball World Cup, national coach Alfred Gislason appointed 17 players to the squad. 12 actors of them won the silver medal at the Olympic Games in Paris. The national coach can nominate 16 players for each individual World Cup game. The DHB squad is led by captain Johannes Golla.

• Tor: David Späth (Rhein-Neckar Löwen), Andreas Wolff (THW Kiel)
• Left wing: Rune Dahmke (THW Kiel), Lukas Mertens (SC Magdeburg)
• Right -wing: Timo Kastening (MT Melsungen), Lukas Zerbe (THW Kiel)
• Back space on the left: Marko Grgic (THSV Eisenach), Julian Köster (VfL Gummersbach), Lukas Stutzke (TSV Hannover-Burgdorf)
• Back space in the middle: Juri Knorr (Rhein-Neckar Löwen), Nils Lichtlein (Füchse Berlin), Luca Witzke (SC DHfK Leipzig)
• Back room on the right: Franz Semper (SC DHfK Leipzig), Christoph Steinert (HC Erlangen), Renars Uscins (TSV Hannover-Burgdorf)
• Kreis: Justus Fischer (TSV Hannover-Burgdorf), Johannes Golla (SG Flensburg-Handewitt)

The 2025 handball World Cup live on TV

The games of the German national team are alle live im Free-TV To see ARD and ZDF Transferred alternately the games of the DHB selection both on TV and in the live stream.

Eurosport In addition, some World Cup games without German participation in free TV. If you want to have access to all World Cup games, you need a WM passport that requires a contestation on the streaming platform Sportdeutschland.TVthat broadcasts all 96 games.

Mode of the 2025 handball World Cup

In the Preliminary round The 32 teams compete in eight groups with four teams each. There are two points for a win, one point for a draw. The first three teams qualify for the main round after the group phase, the eight last -placed teams play out the President’s Cup.

Main round

The first three teams from the preliminary round qualify for the four main groups, each consisting of six teams. For this, the teams take their points from the preliminary round games against the other teams, who have also qualified for the main round. Example of Germany: If Switzerland becomes the bottom of the group, the DHB team only takes the points from the games against Poland and the Czech Republic. The games in the preliminary round also have a meaning for the main round. In the main round, however, the teams no longer play against each other, which have already met in the preliminary round.

K.-O. round

The two groups from the four main round groups finally qualify for the quarter -finals. From here it will be played in the classic knockout mode until the final.

The World Cup venue 2025

For the first time, the World Handball Championship takes place in five cities in three countries. For Croatia Is it the second World Cup after 2009, Denmark is organizer for the third time after 1978 and 2019. For Norway Is it the first world championship in their own country.

Denmark and Norway have nominated a city as the venue for the World Cup. In Denmark, the World Cup games can be found in the multi-purpose arena “Jyske Bank Boxen” in Herning instead, the Norwegian capital Oslo Submit the World Cup games in the “Unity Arena”.

Croatia has set three cities to host the games. The World Cup parts find in Zagreb in the “Arena Zagreb” as well as in Varaždin and in Poreč instead of.

All handball world champions in the overview

France is a record world champion with a total of six titles, followed by Sweden and Romania with four wins each. Germany became world champion three times, among others at the first World Cup 1938, at that time still under the Nazi rule as a German empire. Defending champion Denmark managed to win the World Cup three times in series with the 2023 World Cup title.

• 1938 German Empire
• 1954 Sweden
• 1958 Sweden
• 1961 Romania
• 1964 Romania
• 1967 Czechoslovakia
• 1970 Romania
• 1974 Romania
• 1978 BR Germany
• 1982 Soviet Union
• 1986 Yugoslavia
• 1990 Sweden
• 1993 Russia
• 1995 France
• 1997 Russia
• 1999 Sweden
• 2001 France
• 2003 Croatia
• 2005 Spain
• 2007 Deutschland
• 2009 France
• 2011 France
• 2013 Spain
• 2015 France
• 2017 France
• 2019 Denmark
• 2021 Denmark
• 2023 Denmark