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Niclas Ekberg

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Niclas Ekberg
Ekberg in 2017
Personal information
Born (1988-12-23) 23 December 1988 (age 36)
Ystad, Sweden
Nationality Swedish
Height 1.91 m (6 ft 3 in)
Playing position Right wing
Club information
Current club Ystads IF
Number 18
Senior clubs
Years Team
–2009
 IFK Ystad HK
2009–2010
 Ystads IF
2010–2012
 AG København
2012–2024
 THW Kiel
2024–
 Ystads IF
National team 1
Years Team Apps (Gls)
2008–
 Sweden 210 (841)
Medal record
Olympic Games
Silver medal – second place 2012 London Team
European Championship
Gold medal – first place 2022 Hungary/Slovakia
Silver medal – second place 2018 Croatia
1 National team caps and goals correct
as of 1 July 2024

Niclas Ekberg (born 23 December 1988) is a Swedish professional handballer for Ystads IF and Sweden men's national handball team.[1] He is known to be an exceptionally prolific goalscorer and holds many different goalscoring records at his club, THW Kiel.

Career

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Ekberg started his career at IFK Ystad. In the 2008-2009 season he scored the second most goals in the Swedish league and was named Årets Komet.[2] He then joined city rivals Ystads IF. With Ystad IF he played in the EHF Challenge Cup in the 2009-10 season.[3]

In the summer of 2010 he joined Danish side AG København[4] Here he won back-to-back Danish league and Danish cup doubles. When the club became insolvent in July 2012 Ekberg was released of his contract.

He then joined THW Kiel in Germany on a contract until 2015, which was extended in 2014 until 2018.[5] With Kiel he won the 2013, 2017 and 2019 DHB-Pokal and the 2013, 2014, 2015, 2020 nd 2021 German Championships. He also won the 2019-20 EHF Champions League. He scored 15 goals at the final four event, and with 85 goals overall he became the Champions League top scorer.[6]

In the 2019-20 season Ekberg reached 1000 Bundesliga goals, and replaced Nikolaj Jacobsen as the recordholder for most club penalty goals, when he scored no. 390. In the 2020-21 season he became the fourth most scoring player for THW Kiel, when he overtook Uwe Schwenker at 1224 goals.[7][8] On the 33rd round he reached the milestone of scoring 2000 goals in all competitions for the club. In the 4th round of the 2021-22 season he overtook the club all time league topscorer second place, beating his own coach Filip Jicha (1319 goals).[9] The very next game he scored eleven goals against GWD Minden to overtake Magnus Wislanders record of 1332 league goals and became the club's all time league top scorer. On November 2024 in a Champions League match against Aalborg Håndbold he became the topscorer for the club in all competitions with 2125 goals, 1776 of which were league goals.

In 2023 after twelve years in Kiel, Ekdahl returned to Sweden to join Ystads IF HF on a three year deal.[10]

Bundesligatable

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Season Team League Games Goals Pen. Non-pen.
2012/13 THW Kiel Bundesliga 31 94 36 58
2013/14 THW Kiel Bundesliga 34 98 19 79
2014/15 THW Kiel Bundesliga 36 103 5 98
2015/16 THW Kiel Bundesliga 30 140 38 102
2016/17 THW Kiel Bundesliga 31 137 41 96
2017/18 THW Kiel Bundesliga 34 171 84 87
2018/19 THW Kiel Bundesliga 33 187 89 98
2019/20 THW Kiel Bundesliga 26 164 104 60
2020/21 THW Kiel Bundesliga 33 205 98 107
2021/22 THW Kiel Bundesliga 34 189 99 90
2022/23 THW Kiel Bundesliga 32 137 73 64
2023/24 THW Kiel Bundesliga 34 151 62 89
2012–2024 Total Bundesliga 388 1776 748 1028

Source: Player profile At the Handball-Bundesliga[11]

National team

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Ekdahl played 18 matches for the Swedish U-19 team and 29 matches for the Swedish U-21 team.

His first senior international match was on November 2nd 2008 against Turkey.

He was part of the Swedish team that won silver at the 2012 Summer Olympics.[12] With 50 goals he was the topscorer at the tournament.[13]

From 2017 to 2019 he was the captian of the Swedish national team. He retired from this responsibility, when he took a small break from the national team due to familial reasons.[14]

He represented Sweden at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.[15]

He was also part of the Swedish national team that won the 2022 European Championship. He missed much of the tournament due to a positive covid-19 test, and could only return to the team in the final.[16] In the final against Spain at the score 26:26, Sweden got a penalty after regulation, which could determine the match if it was scored. Ekberg stepped up to meet Pérez de Vargas in the goal, and Ekberg scored, taking the gold medals with them to.Sweden.[17]

At the 2023 World Championship he finished 4th with the Swedish team. He was selected for the All-star team for the tournament.

In October 2023 he announced his retirement from the National team.[18] He did however unretire for the 2025 World Championship. Here Sweden did however have a disappointing tournment, where they finished fourteenth, losing to Brazil and Norway and drewing Portugal in the process.[19]

Titles

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Individual awards

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References

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  1. ^ "Niclas Ekberg Profile". European Handball Federation. Retrieved 16 January 2012.
  2. ^ a b "Niclas Ekberg har fått sin stjärnstatus". Ystads Allehanda. 23 December 2008.
  3. ^ www.eurohandball.com: Niclas Ekberg. retrieved 3. January 2010
  4. ^ "2015 World Championship Roster" (PDF). IHF. Retrieved 15 January 2015.
  5. ^ "Kiel bindet Rechtsaußen langfristig bis 2018" (in German). handball-world.news. 2 December 2014. Retrieved 2 December 2014.
  6. ^ "Top Scorers 2019/20". eurohandball.com. European Handball Federation. Retrieved 30 December 2020.
  7. ^ "Ekberg gegen Wetzlar: Ein Fall für die Geschichtsbücher". www.thw-handball.de (in German). THW Kiel. Retrieved 23 March 2021.
  8. ^ "Ewige Bundesliga-Torschützenliste: Ekberg zieht an Schwenker vorbei". www.thw-handball.de (in German). THW Kiel. Retrieved 12 April 2021.
  9. ^ "30:20 beim HC Erlangen: Sicherer Kieler Erfolg in hitzigem Spiel". www.thw-handball.de (in German). THW Kiel. Retrieved 26 September 2021.
  10. ^ "Niclas Ekberg kehrt am Saisonende zu seinem Heimatverein zurück". thw-handball.de (in German). THW Kiel. 14 December 2023. Retrieved 14 December 2023.
  11. ^ player profile at HBL choose "Statistiken" and "Historisch", retrieved 1. Juli 2024.
  12. ^ "Niclas Ekberg Bio, Stats, and Results". Olympics at Sports-Reference.com. Archived from the original on 17 April 2020. Retrieved 15 October 2017.
  13. ^ a b "Statistics for the Olympic Handball tournament 2012". Retrieved 23 March 2021.
  14. ^ Norberg, Simon. (15 May 2019). "Niclas Ekberg tar paus från landslaget: 'Respekterar beslutet'" (in Swedish). SVT Sport. Retrieved 19 January 2020.
  15. ^ ihf.info: Match Team Statistics: Sweden vs. Bahrain, retrieved 24. July 2021
  16. ^ "Niclas Ekberg tillbaka i matchtruppen – Daniel Pettersson friskförklarad" (in Swedish). handbollskanalen.se/. 25 January 2022. Retrieved 26 January 2022.
  17. ^ Qvirin Pedersen, Jacop (30 January 2022). "Sverige vinder EM-guld efter scoring efter tid" (in Danish). TV2 Danmark. Retrieved 14 February 2025.
  18. ^ "Niclas Ekberg avslutar landslagskarriären". handbollslandslaget.se (in Swedish). Sweden men's national handball team. Retrieved 5 October 2023.
  19. ^ Kjær, Christian (24 January 2025). "Norge og Sverige sendt ud af VM – Brasilien ligner dansk modstander" (in Danish). TV2 Danmark. Retrieved 14 February 2025.
  20. ^ "Poland/Sweden 2023 All-Star Team Revealed". IHF. Retrieved 30 January 2023.
  21. ^ "Niclas Ekberg vald till Årets spelarel" (in Swedish). Ystads Allehanda. Retrieved 3 May 2021.
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