Coach: Oleg Sych

 

Key Players: Viktor Ladyko (Specialist), Oleksandr Poltoratskyi (Left Wing)

 

Road to Qualification: Third (Bronze) – 2015 Men’s EHF European Beach Handball Championships

 

History in Tournament: 2004: 5th, 2006: DNQ, 2008: DNQ, 2010: 12th, 2012: 2nd, 2014: DNQ

 

Overview

The Black Sea resort of Yuzhny in Odessa has been the base for the Ukrainian men’s beach handball team this past month as they prepare for Budapest 2016. Focussing on training only, Coach Oleg Sych has passed on the opportunity of playing warm-up matches as he hopes to rectify some injury issues affecting his squad.

 

Sych, who coaches Ukrainian champions Portovik Yuzhny at club level, has been working with the Ukrainian national beach handball team since 2004 and oversaw their silver at the world championships in Oman, back in 2012, which remains their best finish in the competition.

 

Head Coach since 2006, Sych led the men to a bronze medal at the 2015 Men’s EHF European Beach Handball Championships in Spain which ensured qualification for Budapest 2016. Despite their semi-final loss against Croatia, they managed to pick themselves up for the bronze medal match, beating Hungary 2-1 after winning a shoot out 7-4.

 

Top-scorer in that game was Motor player Dmytro Gunko, with the pivot scoring 14 times and he was backed up by key player Viktor Ladyko, with the specialist smashing home 10 times. Both have been named in the provisional squad for Hungary which, unlike many teams in Budapest, features a diverse mix of countries represented at club level with Turkey, Romania and Lithuania all appearing on the squad sheet.

 

Another key player, left winger Oleksandr Poltoratskyi, is one of those foreign-based club players. The 26-year-old plays for Ankara in Turkey and has club teammate Yuriy Makovskyy alongside him at national level.

 

Sych has identified a podium place and qualification for the 2017 World Games as the goal for his side in what he has described as a “good and difficult” group, which features the holders Brazil, along with Qatar, Egypt, Bahrain and USA.

 

Group at Budapest 2016

Group A: Brazil, Ukraine, Qatar, Egypt, Bahrain, USA

 

Group Games at Budapest 2016

All times local

 

Tuesday 12 July: UKR-USA (10:00)

Tuesday 12 July: BRN-UKR (15:30)

Wednesday 13 July: QAT-UKR (11:40)

Wednesday 13 July: UKR-BRA (21:30)

Thursday 14 July: UKR-EGY (10:50)

 

Fixture link here

 

Official Website/Social Media

 

You can follow the IHF World Beach Handball Championships from Hungary via the official IHF channels at IHF.info, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+.

 

Watch live streams for free and keep up-to-date with all the results on the official tournament website.

For the Ukrainian team:

 

Official Federation website

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