Winning at any cost – a question of ethics
by Christer Ahl (IHF/PRC President)

Under this headline, two seperate themes have been observed:

1.If a team is leading by one goal and there are not many seconds left in the game, there is a clear temptation to use every method, also illegal and dangerous ones, to take away the last chance for the opponents. We have seen several such situations, where the players have been completely cynical .

They have been correctly given a “red card” but they were successful in preventing a scoring chance from arising. Of course, if there is already a scoring chance and they destroy it, then there will be a 7-meter throw, but often the careless foul is committed just before the opponents get to this point.

This clearly involves a very unsportsmanlike attitude and action and it is not good for our image that players can be “successful” in this way. It seems urgent to consider the possibility of a rules change for this situation.

In one match, Iceland – Slovenia, an icelandic player could have used such methods to prevent the deciding goal at the end, but his sense of sportsmanship stopped him from doing that. Instead an opponent used such methods when in the next moment Iceland had a final chance to win this game. But congratulations to the icelandic player for his integrity and strong sense of ethics. This team lost, but the player and his team gained respect!

2.It is part of the game that coaches have spontaneous reactions in response to player actions and referee decisions. There must be tolerance for such human reactions, unless the words and gestures are too unsportsmanlike. Normally, a “yellow card” will tell a coach that he must watch out, because he does not want to cause a 2-minute suspension for his team.

But there also coaches who systematically provoke the referees throughout a match. They tend to receive a “yellow card” but they just continue their behavior. Perhaps the gamble that the referees will reluctant to take the next step and give 2-minute suspension, as they fear that this might escalate the tension between the team and the referees. Of course, the referees must show more courage, but first we must ask: do these coaches not sense that they have a responsibility and a sportsmanlike behavior?
Is “winning at any cost” the only thing that matters?