Croatia

Handball in Austria-Hungary (1904–1918)

The word handball in the Croatian region was first used by Franjo Bučar, describing the German game Schleuderball in the journal Sokol 1904. The earliest documented forms of playing handball in these areas appear in 1911 in the gymnasium of Pazin, which is among other things due to the fact that programs for education in Istria, as part of the then Austrian coast, coming from the education center in Graz. In Croatia, at the time handball was in high school programs closing ceremony. It was a kind of Czech handball extended from the Czech Republic, where it was adopted by the Osijek and Vukovar students from Prague.

Between the two world wars (1918–1941)

In the early beginnings of the Croatian handball, venues played field handball and handball. Students were still more attracted to field handball, because the little handball were played on makeshift courts without the right door, as opposed to the field handball, which is played on the existing football fields. During the Kingdom of Yugoslavia first public handball match in the Croatian region was played and in the wider neighborhood. It was played in a high school in Varaždin 29 May 1930 under the guidance of physical education teachers Zvonimir Šuligoj. Since that game, until 1950, in Croatia and Yugoslavia publicly played exclusively field handball, on the football field with eleven players on each side. In high school in Zagreb on 1 June 1935, opened the first handball courts in Yugoslavia.

The establishment of Croatian Handball Federation and the first Croatian national team (1941–1945)

At the beginning of World War II Kingdom of Yugoslavia disintegrated. Most of the territory inhabited by Croats on 10 April 1941, it became part of the newly formed Independent State of Croatia (NDH). As part of the new state on 2 October 1941 in Zagreb for the first time in history the Croatian Handball Federation (HRS) was established. The place of foundation is recorded to be at the Croatian Sports home in Jurišićeva, Zagreb. HRS is the umbrella organization of handball in the ISC coordinated the work of a dozen clubs and until 1944 organized national championships. In the state of NDH was established the first Croatian handball team. The first training for practice-match team NDH was held on 12 October 1941 between the two teams selected from the head coach Dragutin Pehe. His first and only international match this team played on 14 June 1942 with Hungary in Budapest where they lost 0:9. This field handball match was played in front of 30,000 spectators at the then NEP Stadium (since 2002 Ferenc Puskás Stadium) was a prelude meeting of the football teams of the same name. The best handball player in the field was the goalkeeper Branko Kralj. Under the direction of the coach Ante Škrtić, the players for Croatia were Vlado Abramović, Irislav Dolenec, Žarko Galetović, Zvonko Leskovar, Todor Marinov, Viktor Medved, Krešo Pavlin, Vlado Šimanović Stjepan Širić, Josip Žitnik and reserve goalkeeper Zdenko Šurina. HRS stopped functioning in 1944 because of the war in World War II.

Handball in SFR Yugoslavia (1945–1991)

• Yugoslavia national handball team

When the 1945 World War II ended, the territory of the Independent State of Croatia was included in the newly established SFR Yugoslavia.

Immediately after that began the reconstruction of the war abandoned handball in Yugoslavia, and that same year founded the Committee for handball Gymnastics Association Croatian, and in May 1948 the Committee for handball Gymnastics Association of Yugoslavia. Operation HRS is restored on 19 December 1948, in which he, in accordance with the national policy of the new Yugoslav state, name changed in the Croatian Handball Association (RSH). Handball Federation of Yugoslavia (RSJ) was established on 17 December 1949 in Belgrade by pooling national and provincial associations, and it became a member of the International Handball Federation (IHF) in 1950.

After the end of World War II, most field handball players of NDH completed courses and became instructors or referees in handball. Some of them have become members of the field handball national team of Yugoslavia and played in its first international match, played on 19 June 1950 at the stadium in Stadion Kranjčevićeva in Zagreb, against Belgium. Yugoslavia won 18:3 playing with nine players from Zagreb, one from Split and one from Sarajevo.

Since the end of World War II until the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1991, the best Croatian handball players in field and team handball played for the national team of Yugoslavia. With this national team Croatians have performed at 17 major competitions and won seven medals. These are two Olympic gold medals, the Olympic bronze, world gold, world silver and two bronze world. Among the other famous trophy, in this period they won 5 gold medals in five appearances at the Mediterranean Games (1967, 1975, 1979, 1983 and 1991), two gold and one bronze medal at the World Cups held in 1971, 1974 and 1984 in Sweden, 2 bronze medals at handball Super League held in 1981 and 1983 in Germany and silver at the 1990 goodwill Games in Seattle.

At the World Junior Championship in 1987 in Rijeka there was created a nucleus generation that will define the nineties and bring some of the most beautiful handball stories for the Croatian national team. Alvaro Načinović, Iztok Puc, Vladimir Jelčić and other predominantly have won this championship playing for Yugoslavia, and their talent and knowledge are later incorporated as seniors in the first Croatian success after independence of the country.