German IOC Vice-President Willi Daume in particular made considerable efforts in order for handball to be included in the Olympic Programme again after the Berlin Games in 1936. Daume had among others been president of the German handball federation before. And the return of handball under the Olympic rings saw a mammoth tournament, as a total of 16 teams participated whereas women had to wait for their Olympic debut. After the preliminaries a main round including a total of eight teams split up into two groups of four was staged. After completion of three matches Czechoslovakia and the GDR had earned an equal number of points but Czechoslovakia’s better goal difference brought them to the final. In Group II Yugoslavia earned three easy wins to qualify for the final. Romania ranked second in that group and earned their first ever Olympic handball medal at the hall after their 19:16(11:8) victory over the GDR in the match for bronze. Yugoslavia proved predominant throughout the entire tournament and in the final too to soar to their first Olympic gold: They earned a 21:16 win that was a pretty clear result at that time, over Czechoslovakia, and were home and dry with a comfortable 12:5 half-time score. Handball legends such as goalkeeper Abas Arslanagic, Hrovje Horvat or Zoran Zivkovic were part of the Yugoslavian team. All of them proved successful as coaches later on as well. The Olympic champions’ coach was Vlado Stenzel, who led the German men’s squad to a WCh gold medal six years later. The host team, which had have high hopes at the beginning of the tournament, finished sixth in the final ranking.

 

Gold: YUG, Silver: TCH, Bronze: ROM, 4. GDR - 5. URS - 6. FRG - 7. SWE - 8. HUN - 9. NOR - 10. POL - 11. JPN - 12. ISL - 13. DEN - 14. USA - 15. ESP - 16. TUN