– It was a blister – VG

BRATISLAVA (VG) Sebastian Barthold only had to put the ball in the net. But Christian Berg put an end to that with his fist of the time-out button with 14 seconds left in Saturday’s match against Germany.

But Norway lost the safe goal It ended up winning by five goals – Not six – against the Germans (23-28). The goal difference can be decisive in the European Championship.

“They took me to sleep a little because Berg didn’t want me to score there,” admitted Sebastian Barthold. Instead of a duel against Germany goalkeeper Johannes Peter, there was one minute of “time-out” on the touchline.

– It was taken so we could have a good ending, but I think Berg missed a really good opportunity. It was a blister. “Sorry,” he says afterwards, says Barthold who believes Bigrey was “more interested in time than where the ball is.”

– I looked at the button and did not see what happened, says Christian Berg, who in another way succeeded in tactics against Germany.

– It wasn’t funny when I later had to say “goal difference matters, boys,” says Berg who emphasized that he wouldn’t have stopped Barthold had he just seen he got the ball.

It grew between 2,000 spectators right after the somewhat bizarre episode. Norway came to an end at the last second, but Sander Sagosin failed to score the ball into the goal.

“It was a little bad,” says Christian Bjornsen, who was sitting right behind the national team coach on the bench when Norway got the ball 19 seconds into the game.

While at the European Championships, Thorir Hergeirsson received criticism after not using his last chance to stop the match, Christian Berg was too fast on his paw.

In theory, Tuesday’s semi-final place could be decided on the basis of mutual or aggregate goal teams between two or more nations. Spain, Norway, Sweden, Germany and Russia still have more or less chance of progressing in the tournament.

– We don’t know how important these differences in goals are before they finally count, says Sebastian Barthold, Norway’s top scorer in Europe with 31 goals so far.

Many factors can play here. It is important to play the matches in full. There were many teams that smoked on one goal and with all their bullshit, really, he says.

The Handball Girls lost the 2018 European Championship semi-finals by one goal.

The winning margin is not in focus in the first 50-55 minutes of matches. Then it comes to winning. It would be a mistake to search for the largest possible margin before then. But 5-6 minutes before the end we took a ‘timeout’ and talked about that every ball and every goal counts.

Glenn Solberg was particularly evident when Sweden were on track to beat Russia earlier this week.

– Every goal is important. Every goal counts, the Norwegian coach taking on his homeland for the first time in Tuesday’s final drama.

– This is exciting. You can not relax. All matches and goals count, says Sebastian Barthold and Christian Björnsen follows.

– It can get like that quickly. But we didn’t feel much about it. This is still up to us. If we win against Spain and Sweden, says the vice-captain, we will anyway go to the semi-finals.

Spain alone is what we are thinking about now. Then what’s to come next, believes Christian Berg ahead of Sunday’s European Championship game.