Egyptian handball team struggling ahead of World Cup

The Egyptian handball national team's head coach Roberto García Parrondo said that the recent spread of covid-19 infection has had its impact on the team's preparation for the World Cup tournament set to be held in Egypt between 13 and 31 January pointing out that officials at the Egyptian handball federation are doing everything they can to provide everything the group needs.

"We had more than 10 infections last month which caused trouble in relation to our training. We had to accept the situation as everyone did their best but what happened was out of our hands" the Spanish coach told the tournament's official website.

"I would like to thank the players for making so much effort at a tough time as they are working really hard to get ready for the competition," he added.

Parrondo also noted that the final squad for the competition will be announced soon according to the players' form in training as all players dream of representing their national team in such a big event but unfortunately he can't select all of them.

Parrondo wished his program had been implemented successfully:

About the negative impact of the pandemic on the team's preparation, he stated" We definitely were affected by covid-19, we had set a program previously as we were supposed to play friendly games in March and then prepare for the Olympic games for two months with playing six friendly games against big teams and six other official games in November and 8 friendly games in December".

"We weren't able to train for six months, whereas players weren't playing handball for 4 months which is unfortunate but I don't like to think about it now. Our form would have been to a lot better than it is if the program had been correctly executed" he continued.

Egypt is set to host the World Cup between 13 and 31 of January with the system of health bubble as the country is currently facing the second wave of covid-19.