By Sports Reporter/Ljubuski, Bosnia

Qatar failed to capitalise on a blistering start, against the Netherlands, and lost their third game in a row (19-26) at the IHF Junior World Championship at the Gradska Sportska Dvorana Indoor Hall in Ljubuski, Bosnia and Herzegovina yesterday.

Qatar took a two-goal lead before the game was even a minute old. Hadi Hamdoon opened the scoring in the 33rd second. Eldar Memisevic, returning from an ankle injury, intercepted a Dutch attack to score a stunner 20 seconds later.

And things did not stop there. Firas Chaieb and Kamalaldin Mallash scored back-to-back goals to make it 4-0 for Qatar with three minutes on the clock. Hadi then converted from the 7M line to make it 5-0.

Both Hamdi Ayed and Chaieb received yellow cards in the eighth minute, for rough conduct. It slowed Qatar’s momentum. Jeron van Beucken scored twice for the Netherlands to cut Qatar’s lead to four goals (3-7). But Maamoun Saad converted a 7M throw immediately afterwards to take Qatar to 8-3.

The Dutchmen then started to turn things around. Their goalkeeper Bart Ravensbergen saved three shots
at goal and Van Beucken scored from the counterattacks (8-6). With 10 goals, he was his team’s top scorer.

Dario Polman, the Netherlands’ top-scorer in the first two matches, opened his account in the 22nd (11-9). The side equalised for the first time five minutes later (11-11).

The Qatar camp suffered some anxious moments when Selvedin Omahic limped out after taking a tumble. Holland then went into the lead for the first time through Sonni de Jong (12-11). Samir Benghanem made it 13-11 at the stroke of half-time.

In the second half, the men in orange started from where they had left off and raced to a 15-11 lead within four minutes. But Qatar too kept scoring (15-13).

However, Qatari players’ body language moved from bad to worse in the final 15 minutes. Coach Dragan Zovko took a calculated risk by substituting goalkeeper Grco Mirnes with Abdulaziz Althafiri. The move proved to be only marginally successful.

Qatar captain Maamoun Saad received a red card in the 59th after being penalised for three two-minute violations.

Buoyed by the vociferous support from the stands, Dutch defenders broke most of Qatar’s attacks. They played with increased confidence and earned a well-deserved victory.

Zovko was unhappy with his wards’ performance. “I don’t know what the problem is. We play well for 15, 30 or 45 minutes, but never the full 60 minutes. I’ll try to talk to the players and figure out the problem. We need to win against Algeria and Switzerland to have any hopes of progressing to the second round,” he said. Qatar take on Algeria today.