How Hungary made it to the semi-final

France, Norway and Denmark were the big three favourites to make the semi-finals, and they duly achieved that goal. Co-hosts Hungary had more of an underdog chance from the beginning but have played a convincing tournament so far.

Rating teams overall in tournaments is not easy, as they do not all play against the same opponents and the differences in opponents’ quality can sometimes be huge. Usually, rating teams by numbers that are adjusted for possessions played is significantly more meaningful than just the raw number of goals (conceded). It makes the teams actually comparable since the raw number of goals is not only influenced by efficiency, but also by the number of possessions (whether a team and their opponents play rather fast or slow).

But to even out the aforementioned problems, the numbers can also be adjusted for opponent strength. The adjustment is done by calculating how many goals (conceded) per 50 possessions would be expected for each game and team by the number of goals the opponents scored and conceded per 50 possessions in their other games.

So-called “garbage time”, when the game is already decided, is also filtered out. The differences to the actual goals scored and conceded can then be added to the goals scored or conceded per 50 possessions to create an adjusted rating.

According to this, Hungary rank third in offensive efficiency with 28.6 opponent adjusted goals scored per 50 possessions, not far behind leaders Denmark (29.6) and second placed Norway (29.4). Unadjusted Hungary would have also ranked third, but the differences to the top teams would be much bigger.

A lot of weight on few shoulders in attack

Vlagyimir Golovin's squad are very disciplined in attack and make few mistakes. They only lose the ball 9.4 times per 50 possessions, the third lowest figure in the tournament. In terms of shooting percentage, they are only eighth with 60.1 per cent.

However, they make up for some of this with the luck of the brave, as they had the second most second chances among the teams in the main round. Hungary keep possession after 20 per cent of their missed shots. They also have the second fewest penalty minutes among the teams in the main round, with 5.7 per game.

When it comes to exact shooting positions, it is noticeable that Hungary look for the wings a lot. At 6.5 metres, their average throwing distance is slightly below average, but the average angle between the throwing position, the middle of the goal and the nearest baseline is only greater than that of the Faroe Islands at 54.9 degrees.

In fact, Hungary also have by far the second highest proportion of throws from the wings after the Faroese with 26.2 per cent of all their shots. At the same time, with a success rate of 69.5 per cent from there, they are also the fourth most efficient team among the main round teams.

They are also quite dangerous from distance. With a shooting percentage of 42.9, only three teams had a better average, but distance shots are generally not particularly efficient compared to all other shots.

Hungary’s focus on the wingers also shows in the player statistics. Just eight players at EHF EURO 2024 have attempted at least 45 non-penalty shots. Viktória Gyori-Lukács is the most efficient among them with 70.2 per cent and also the only winger on the list.

Among these eight players with more than 45 non-penalty shots there are two other Hungarians with Csenge Kuczora and Katrin Klujber. Slovenia and Switzerland each have two players on the list, and Montenegro one, while eight main round teams have none.

The offensive responsibility shows a similar picture. It shows the proportion of non-penalty shots, seven-metre shots received and turnovers by the player in relation to those of her team in games in which she has played. Hungary is the only team with three players in the top 15 (Klujber 15.7 per cent, Petra Vamos 14.7 per cent, Csenge Kuczora 14.5 per cent).

Both of these statistical points could indicate that some players may be carrying too much weight. Especially with Klujber, their most important offensive player is struggling from the field as she is last on the list of players that have attempted at least 45 non-penalty shots, with 47.3 per cent. Spreading the load over more shoulders could therefore be the key for the Hungarians to bring their good offence to an elite level.

Defence and physicality

Defensively, however, the opposite effect can be seen as with the attack data. According to the raw numbers, Hungary would be in fourth place. Including the strength of their opponents, they rank eighth with 23.0 goals conceded per 50 possessions.

The more detailed statistics also show that they are good everywhere, but not quite at the top. Among the teams that made it to the main round they rank fifth in forced turnovers with 13.1 per 50 possessions, fourth in opponents’ shooting percentage with 54.5 and fourth in save percentage with 35.4 per cent.

Shooting-wise the wings are again noticeable because they allow the second highest share of wing shots with 20.8 per cent, but their opponents have the worst shooting efficiency with just 44.8 per cent.

Among the Hungarian players, especially goalkeeper Zsófi Szemerey stands out. Of the 11 goalkeepers who have faced 125 or more shots on their goal at EHF EURO 2024, she has the second-best save percentage (39.2 per cent). Of the 11 goalkeepers who have faced 100 or more non-penalty shots, she is in first place with 41.3 per cent.

The physical numbers of the Hungarians are also very interesting. With 30.3 kilometres run per game, they ran the second least among the main round teams. Their opponents, on the other hand, ran the fourth most with 31.5km. In total, their opponents ran 1.4km more per game. No other team that made it to the main round managed to make their opponents run so much more than them.

The semi-final

But, of course, Hungary are still the underdogs in the semi-final against favourites Norway, who are also playing an outstanding tournament in terms of numbers. In offence, the Scandinavians rank first with 29.4 opponent-adjusted goals per 50 possessions.

Their defensive efficiency is, with opponent-adjusted 18.8 goals conceded per 50 possessions, clearly the best of the competition. This leads to a net difference between offensive and defensive efficiency of +10.6, which is by far the best of the competition as well, while Hungary rank fourth with +5.7.

Norway hardly ever make mistakes and are very experienced. With an average age of 31.2 years (weighted by minutes played), they are comfortably the oldest team in the tournament. Among all teams, Hungary’s average age of 26.7 is also around the tournament average, but they are the youngest of the semi-final teams.

So, the majority of Hungary’s most important players will be around for years to come, and the successes of the youth teams will continue to pay off. An important part of this will be 20-year-old Petra Simon who is already showing in limited minutes how great she will be in the future. At 73.1 per cent, she has the second-best shooting percentage among all backcourt players with at least 25 shots.

Nevertheless, the numbers are currently clearly in Norway's favour and Hungary will need a lot of luck and certainly another outstanding performance by Szemerey to have a chance. So, Norway could still be a little too big this year. But perhaps not in the near future.

More from data analyst Julian Rux can be found at Handballytics.de. There you can read his latest articles, in which he analyses all kinds of handball topics from new, data-based perspectives. You can also find him on Instagram, Bluesky, Threads and WhatsApp channels.

Photos © EHF/kolektiff