Germany was crowned world champion at the Fistball World Cup. In the final, Olaf Neuenfeld’s team beat Austria 4-0. For Germany it was the fourth consecutive world title and the 13th overall.
Around 8,000 spectators celebrated the German fistball players in the SAP Arena in Mannheim after winning the title. In the final, the German team beat Austria 4-0 (11-7, 11-3, 15-14, 11-7).
Germany sovereign in the first two sentences
As in the 3-0 victory in the semifinals against Brazil, the German team started the game with Patrick Thomas, Johannes Jungclaussen, Fabian Sagstetter, Jaro Jungclaussen and Jonas Schröter. The Germans were there from the start and showed no nerves despite the impressive crowd. The team of national coach Neuenfeld scored points again and again, especially thanks to the strong serves of world-class player Patrick Thomas. But Austria also got into the game well and stayed close to the favorites until the score was 5:4. But then Germany got better and better at acceptance and drew away point by point. Johannes Jungclaussen from TV Vaihingen/Enz smashed the ball to make it 8:4 and gave the team a comfortable lead. The host didn’t let that be taken away either and converted the second set ball to 11:7.
Even after the change of sides, Germany continued where it left off in the first set: the record world champion showed almost no mistakes in acceptance or attack and quickly developed a 5-1 lead. Austria found it difficult to fend off Thomas’ attacks, which were up to 140 km/h, and had little to counter in the second set. Germany made short work of it and won the second set with 11:3.
Exciting third sentence: Austria on an equal footing with Germany
In the third set, the Austrians made some personnel changes and found their way back into the game better. Germany now showed the first small difficulties in the acceptance and let the Austrian team equalize to 5:5 in the meantime. At this stage of the game, the two teams met on an equal footing for the first time and the 2007 World Champion made it exciting again until the end of the third set against the top favorite. Austria’s Müllehner kept his team in the game with strong and very variable information. When the score was 14:14, however, Thomas got the decisive point to win the set 15:14.
The fourth set also started balanced and the two teams gave the audience some spectacular rallies. Austria presented themselves as the strongest World Cup opponents so far, but also didn’t manage to wrest a set from the German team. The Neuenfeld team did not lose a set over the entire course of the tournament and celebrated their fourth World Cup title in a row after the 11:7 in the fourth set.