Handball Star in Tbilisi’s Sports Palace

Respect your Talent – Activity day with Anja Althaus The star of German national team and Hungarian club Gyor, Anja Althaus, visited young handball players in Tbilisi Sports Palace During the Women’s U17 EHF Championship.

European Handball Federation is starting a new project since women’s young age championship 2019. It’s called “Respect your Talent”. The purpose of this project is to discover young and talented handball players and help them develop their handball careers.

A lot of famous handball stars, like Althaus herself, Stine Oftedal (Norway), Nerea Pena (Spain), Johana Alm (Sweden), Anna Gross (Slovenia), take part In European women’s championships programme of 2019 with the help of this project.

According to the project, the best players of European young age championship – the ones who were named the best player or are named in the dream team of the championship – Will get noticed by European Federation: In 2020, they will participate in a training camp which will be made especially for them and their career achievements will not be unnoticed by the media.

On Friday 40 players of the 10 competing teams gathered in Tbilisi Sports Palace – the ones who were named as the best players. They had a two hour chat with Anja Althaus. The main subjecte of the meeteng was handball, of course – the motivation a young handball player should have, the relationship with media, knowledge and double career planning…

Althaus quit her handball career in 2018, at age 36, after winning champions league twice with Hungarian club Gyor – which she had already won while playing in Denmark and Germany. She had also been a champion of Bundesliga twice and won a bronze prize of the world championship in 2007 while playing in Germany national team.

Anja Althaus: – EHF new project, “Respect you Talent” is very interesting. I told the girls about my and my colleagues’ careers and I shared my experiences with them – I told them about my success and failure. It’s my first time in Georgia. To tell the truth, I did not know much about this Country but judging from what I learned in a day, I can tell you that I will be back here as a tourist for sure. I’ve already told my husband, family members, friends what an interesting country it is.