Bells and glory at the Handball final

Olympic London 2012 event report - Handball finals

Anne Helene Harbitz reports on going to see Olympic Handball final with her parents and husband Andy Roland-Price, Head of Group Accounts in the Finance Division.

“When we first told my handball enthusiast parents that we were going to try and get Olympic handball tickets so we could all go to the Women’s semi-final, my parents immediately scoffed, and said, “No, no, we want to go to the final, the final!”

Handball is extremely popular in my native Norway, at all levels, and when it comes to the Summer Olympics it is the only sport we’re practically certain to get a medal in. Winter sports is more our thing and when the Olympics were held in Lillehammer in 1994 we were frequent spectators at events there. Having taken gold in Beijing and being reigning World Champions, our medal hopes were high for London 2012.

Thankfully Norway reached the final and the excitement was high as we descended on the Olympic Park with our Norwegian flags, and cowbells. The latter is a Norwegian custom from the Lillehammer Olympics and a staple of Norwegian supporters ever since. Andy represented the UK with a Union Jack.

Stewards with megaphones were situated along the path to the stadium and were smiling and cracking jokes. It was a buzzing atmosphere and a bit surreal to finally see the big athletics stadium and the Orbit up close. It brought home, that we were finally here, and part of the Games.

Interestingly, despite being virtually an unknown sport in Britain, the t-shirt that was sold out in both souvenir shops was the handball one. Luckily we managed to get one at a small stall outside the basketball arena, a large white futuristic looking cube, where the final was being held.

The place was swarming with our fellow countrymen with flags, cowbells, and patriotic shirts and trousers, even a Norwegian flag suit! It was almost like at Lillehammer. Inside, the arena was packed and wild cheers of “Norge Norge” (Norway) followed by cowbell noises rang through the air, with the occasional chant from the supporters of our opposing team, Montenegro. The Mexican wave flew by several times and at intervals people were dancing in the aisles.

The game was thrilling and rather tense at times. Especially towards the end when Montenegro kept catching up with us and we nearly lost our one point lead. With only two minutes remaining Montenegro leveled the score again, and the Norwegians tried to score rapidly three times in a row, with the Montenegrin keeper saving each one. Luckily we managed to get another one in at the end and with 30 seconds left, Norway were in attack and the stadium rose to its feet. The whistle blew and Norway had won!

By that time we had no voices left but the sound of bells ringing through the air was deafening. At the medal ceremony we managed to find a bit of voice left to belt out the national anthem.

Later on after exiting the arena we were caught up in a crowd of Norwegians celebrating outside and were filmed by NRK, the Norwegian Broadcasting Service. The crowd was jumping up and down, ringing bells, waving little flags and chanting. My parents probably being the most enthusiastic ones!”