START7: The promise of points in the second half of the season

2019, 2021, 2023 and 2025 - the Danish national handball team has managed to win the World Handball Championship four times in a row for the first time. With their 37th consecutive World Championship victory, Gidsel & Co. secured their second consecutive victory at a major tournament after winning the Olympic title last summer. Twelve players from the DAIKIN HBL, who are also absolute top performers at their clubs, played a major part in this historic success. Especially managers of the handball fantasy manager START7, who know that the Scandinavians are part of their team, must have been delighted with the strong form of their protégés.

They already had an absolute points guarantee in the first round of the DAIKIN HBL: together, the world champions scored an incredible 3906 points - with players such as Lasse Møller (354 points, market value: €2.4 million) or Frederik Bo Andersen (279 points, market value: €1.4 million) not even making it into Nikolaj Jacobsen's squad!

The brightest star is and remains the new and old World Championship MVP, Mathias Gidsel. With 846 points scored and a market value of €2.5 million, he leads the START7 rankings in every respect. All Star team member Simon Pytlick (419 points, market value: €2.4 million) is the third-best halfback in the Fantasy Manager - ahead of him are two other World Cup drivers, Berlin's Lasse Andersson (485 points, market value: €2.5 million) and Eisenach's Marko Grgic (674 points, market value: €2.4 million). More evidence?! Emil Jakobsen ranks second on the left wing, Lukas Jørgensen and Magnus Saugstrup rank third and fourth in the circle, Emil Madsen ranks fifth at half-right, behind first-placed Gidsel, and Kevin Møller is the fifth-best keeper in the league according to START7 points.

But: The Danes are very expensive! If you don't have at least a million euros at your disposal, you don't need to think about signing a newly crowned world champion. However, exceptions prove the rule: Johan Hansen (85 points, market value: 846 thousand euros), Magnus Landin (-7 points, market value: 683 thousand euros) and Mads Mensah Larsen (77 points, market value: 857 thousand euros), the three players who have played in all four of Denmark's World Cup titles, are available to managers for six-figure sums.

But it wasn't just the Danish team that impressed at the World Championships. The co-hosts and finalists Croatia also fought their way to the silver medal with a great deal of mentality and will to win. Ivan Martinovic, who was named All Star half-breaker and is also playing at world-class level for the Rhein-Neckar Löwen this season, was outstanding. With 547 START7 points, he was not the most expensive player in the game for nothing (market value now: 2.4 million euros). His team-mates Dominik Kuzmanovic (331 points, market value: €1.8m), Marko Mamic (104 points, market value: €320k) and Domagoj Duvnjak (524 points, market value: €2.4m) also made a major contribution to their team's success.

The collective performances of the teams from Brazil and Portugal, on the other hand, provided some surprises. Due to the early departure of Melsungen's Alexandre Cavalcanti (57 points, market value: 418 thousand euros) for the Portuguese team and the absence of Rogerio Moraes (123 points, market value: 591 thousand euros) for the Brazilians, no DAIKIN HBL professional played for these teams. Instead, a number of individual players from the ‘strongest league in the world’ were once again in the spotlight on the world stage. Eisenach's Simone Mengon (251 points, market value: 998 thousand euros), for example, was one of the top scorers at the World Cup. Göppingen's Rutger ten Velde (8 points, market value: 151 thousand euros) finished seventh among the tournament's top scorers, although he only played six of a possible nine games with the Dutch side. He is just as attractive a transfer for the second half of the season as Lenny Rubin (70 points, market value: €547,000), Domenico Ebner (39 points, market value: €754,000) and Albin Lagergren (135 points, market value: €900,000), who performed particularly well for their country after mixed games at the club.

And the Germans? Even if Alfred Gislason's men were not quite able to carry their promising form from the league through the tournament, the DHB players showed what they are made of in the group phase and main round. Renars Uscins (565 points, market value: 2.4 million euros) once again scored the most points for the German Eagles and Andreas Wolff (497 points, market value: 2.3 million euros) kept what could be kept. Back at the clubs, however, the cards will now be reshuffled - just like for all those who did not take part in the World Cup.

Potsdam's Nils Fuhrmann (104 points, market value: 303 thousand euros) is currently the cheapest START7 player with over 100 points. Also in the Eagles' squad and worth signing: Max Günther (136 points, market value: 272 thousand euros). Christopher Bissel (204 points, market value: €578 thousand) is comparatively inexpensive for 200 points or more, as are Jonathan Fischer (214 points, €674 thousand), Stefan Cavor (218 points, €710 thousand) and Jacob Arenth Lassen (308 points, market value: €1 million).

Either way, the competition is on in the DAIKIN HBL and the START7 game! It will be exciting to see how the players perform in the league and in the manager game after the World Cup.