The International Handball Federation issued a statement regarding the allegations that Slovenia handball players were poisoned on the night of their match against the Egyptian national team at the end of the main round of the World Handball Championship held in Egypt.
Egypt and Slovenia game ended in a draw, thus the Pharaohs, along with the Swedish national team, qualified for the quarter-finals of the tournament.
In its statement, the IHF stated that despite the Slovenian delegation did not request, whether on the day of the match or the previous day, to launch an investigation, the International Federation has started one.
According to the statement, the handball governing body has asked the respective governmental body in charge of food quality control to give a statement and investigate to know if this was indeed food poisoning.
The IHF then sent a letter addressing the Slovenian Head of Delegation and the President of the National Federation, mentioning the findings of a report received from the Ministry of Health which included the following facts:
In the evening after the match against Egypt, at 21:00 CAT, one player of the Slovenian team was reported to the clinic in the hotel with a claim of stomach problems and diarrhoea.
According to him, it was the first time he suffered from sickness. In the clinic, he was provided with medication to treat this condition.
Following this event, the clinic doctor in the hotel received the Head of Delegation, who claimed that 14 players had the same problems as well as players in other teams.
He also claimed that this is a kind of food poisoning. The clinic doctor as well as the Ministry of Health Medical Commission Chairman subsequently asked for the players to be checked medically to know the reason for this condition on the one hand and to be able to treat them on the other. The team doctor refused to let the players get checked.
The clinic doctor also offered to transfer the players to the hospital – again, the team doctor refused.
We would like to emphasise at this point that any medical help which was offered, including any medicine for treatment, has been refused by the team doctor, the statement added.
The Ministry of Health also organised a meeting with all teams to check if there had been similar cases. None of the teams reported cases of this kind in this meeting.
The IHF did not receive any official complaint from any of the participating teams related to the food served during the course of the event.
On the contrary, the Belarus delegation, who were accommodated in the same hotel and shared the same buffet from the main round onwards (as two teams shared one buffet, Slovenia and Belarus shared the same one), had no issues of any kind.
Chief of the Belarus national handball team Oleg Lebedev stated: “We had no problems or complaints about the quality of hotel accommodation, the quality of food and measures to prevent COVID-19.”
On the day that Slovenia claimed that their players ate poisoned food, the Belarus team ate from the same buffet as well, without any negative consequences.
As for the match itself, Slovenia claimed that nine players played even though they were not well.
They partly blame this – and, thus, the alleged food poisoning – for their performance. However, it has to be stated that the team played a good match and even were in the lead by five goals in the beginning of the second half. There was no indication on the field that the players underperformed due to sickness, the statement went on.
Also, the Organising Committee of the 27th IHF Men’s World Championship informed the International Handball Federation that they reserve their right to appeal to the IHF legal bodies.
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