Effective dribble play used in set attacks in world-class women’s handball competition

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to reveal the actual situation of dribble play in the set attack in world-class women’s handball and to identify effective dribble play by analyzing the relationship between dribble play and attack performance. From 8 women’s finals tournament games of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, 861 scenes of dribble play in set attacks at numerically equal situations were extracted, and notational game performance analysis was conducted.

The main results were as follows:

1) Dribble play that moves a large area tended to result in assist passes. Moreover, dribble play in stage 1 was ineffective, while it resulted in a high percentage of shots, assist passes, and 7m throws in stage 2.

2) Dribble play used in combination with a pivot resulted in a high percentage of shots, assist passes, and turnovers. Moreover, its effectiveness was 4.29 times higher than that of dribble play in parallel, cross, and individual play. Furthermore, over 80% of dribble play in parallel and cross combination plays led to passes.

3) Dribble play in individual plays resulted in a high percentage of shots, 7m throws, and free throws.

These results suggest that, in world-class women’s handball, dribble plays are effective when moving over a large area or creating mismatches with defenders, and dribbling plays in combination with pivots are effective, but require advanced technical and tactical skills to realize, furthermore, while dribbling in individual plays is effective, but it may not lead to a continuation of the attack.