The purpose and goals: The main purpose and goal of my master's thesis was to analyse all matches of Slovenia national men's handball team using the collected data and video analyses of the matches and to determine which structural elements show statistically significant differences between different time periods. Further on, we wanted to determine if the team has deviations in its game and in which period of a game they most frequently occur.
Methodology: From The International Handball Federation's website we have gathered and analysed the official data of the games played by the Slovenia men's national team at the 2017 Men’s Handball World Championship in France. The sample comprised of nine matches. Our national team won six matches, lost two, one match ended in a tie. Seventeen variables were chosen from the official statistics and we divided them into parameters related to activities in the attack and activities in the defence. Hypotheses were formed on the basis of the selected parameters which we later tried to confirm or reject. Using the computer software for statistics (SPSS) we calculated basic statistical characteristics for all the parameters and a test statistic. Based on the results of Shapiro – Wilk test of normality of distribution and Levene's test of homogeneity of variance, ANOVA or Brown Forsythe test was later used to determine the differences between the groups.
Findings: None of the analysed parameters showed statistically significant differences between the 10 minutes sections of the match. This can be attributed to a small sample of matches (9). However, with the help of descriptive statistic, we have provided a few game characteristics of our national team and its opponents. Slovenian team was quite effective because it had an under average number of attacks and shots at the tournament but at the same time an above average number of scored goals. It was most effective from wing positions and penetrations, suggesting a fast and penetrating attack. The latter also proves an above average number of assists in the case of a win. When Slovenian team lost a match, it was mostly the opening period (1-10 min) when it was the least efficient in the goals scored (2, 5).
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