Montenegro women's national handball team

Montenegro has been playing in official competitions since 2006.[1] They played for the first time during the qualifying tournament for the 2007 World Women's Handball Championship in Cheb, where they finished second with four wins and one defeat. A year later, Montenegro did not qualify for the 2008 European Women's Handball Championship after a defeat in the playoffs against Croatia. The same result occurred at qualifiers for the 2009 World Women's Handball Championship in China, as Montenegro lost to Sweden in the playoffs.

Montenegro's first significant success came in 2010. After passing the qualifiers without any defeats, the team participated in the 2010 European Women's Handball Championship in Denmark and Norway. Montenegro finished in sixth place, with 46 goals from Montenegro's Bojana Popović.

For the first time, Montenegro played at the IHF World Women's Handball Championship in 2011. After passing the group stage, Montenegro was eliminated by Spain in the round of 16.

On 11 August 2012, Montenegro won a silver medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. On 16 December 2012, they became champions at the 2012 European Women's Handball Championship in Belgrade.

At the 2012 Summer Olympics, Montenegro passed the group round with two defeats but won elimination matches against France and Spain. In the final match, Montenegro was defeated by Norway 23–26. With their second place title, Montenegro won the first Olympic medal for Montenegro since their country became independent. Bojana Popović and Katarina Bulatović were prominent players on the team during this tournament.

At the 2012 European Women's Handball Championship in Serbia, Montenegro won its first title at a major handball championship. In the semi-finals, Montenegro defeated Serbia 27–26. In the finals, Montenegro defeated Norway 34–31, winning the championship. The players Katarina Bulatović and Jovanka Radičević played significant roles in the team's victory. With 56 goals, Bulatović was the top scorer of the championship.

Montenegro won both medals, in London and in Belgrade, with head coach Dragan Adžić.

After two successes in 2012, Montenegro was eliminated by Denmark in the round of 16 at the 2013 World Women's Handball Championship.

Montenegro did well in the 2014 European Women's Handball Championship. After making it to the semi-finals, the team was defeated by Spain. In the end, Montenegro finished in fourth place.

Montenegro made significant strides in the 2015 World Women's Handball Championship. After a notable win against Hungary 32–15, Montenegro eliminated Angola in the round of 16. However, in the quarterfinals, Norway defeated Montenegro 26–25. That was the first performance of Montenegro in the quarterfinals of a World Women's Handball Championship.

At their second appearance in the Summer Olympics, Montenegro did not perform as well, in the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics. With five defeats during the group stage, Montenegro finished in nearly last place.

After the Olympics, Montenegro made big changes to the team and recruited many new young players produced by ŽRK Budućnost. The first main competition for the newly formed team was at the 2016 European Women's Handball Championship, where Montenegro had the youngest team. With one win and two defeats, the team finished in 13th place.

In November 2017, The Handball Federation of Montenegro stated that the new head coach of the national team would be Per Johansson instead of Dragan Adžić, who had served the team for seven years. As a coach, Adžić led Montenegro to nine big international competitions, winning gold during the 2012 European Championship and silver during the Summer Olympics the same year.

With a new head coach, Montenegro finished sixth in the 2017 World Women's Handball Championship, with equal wins and losses, 3–1–3. The next year, they played at the 2018 European Women's Handball Championship in France but did not succeed. After six games, Montenegro finished the tournament in ninth place.

Montenegro has participated in three Summer Olympics (2012, 2016 and 2020). In 2012, the women's handball team won the first Olympic medal for Montenegro since their independence.

Olympic Games							Qualification
Year	Pos.	Pld	W	D	L		Pld	W	D	L
2008	Did not qualify						Did not qualify
2012	2nd	8	4	1	3		3	3	0	0
2016	11th	5	0	0	5		3	2	1	0
2020	6th	6	2	0	4		2	1	0	1
2024	Did not qualify						3	1	0	2
Total		19	6	1	12		9	7	1	3

Montenegro has participated in six World Championships. After failing to qualify for championships 2007 and 2009, they have participated in seven consecutive tournaments. The best results Montenegro had were in 2015 and 2017, when they played in the quarterfinals.

World Championship							Qualification
Year	Pos.	Pld	W	D	L		Pld	W	D	L
2007	did not qualify						5	4	0	1
2009							7	5	1	1
2011	10th	6	3	0	3		2	2	0	0
2013	11th	6	4	0	2		DNP
2015	8th	9	5	1	3		2	1	1	0
2017	6th	7	3	1	3		2	1	0	1
2019	5th	9	7	0	2		2	1	0	1
2021	22nd	6	1	0	5		2	2	0	0
// 2023	7th	9	5	0	4		DNP
/ 2025	to be determined						TBD
2027
2029
/ 2031
Total		46	27	2	17		22	16	2	4

Montenegro has participated in seven European Championships. After having failed to qualify for the European Championship 2008, they have participated in all subsequent tournaments. Montenegro was the European champion in 2012, the bronze medalist in 2022 when was a co-host along with Slovenia and North Macedonia, and a semi-finalist in 2014.

European Championship							Qualification
Year	Pos.	Pld	W	D	L		Pld	W	D	L
2008	did not qualify						6	4	0	2
2010	6th	7	4	0	3		6	5	1	0
2012	1st	8	7	0	1		6	5	0	1
2014	4th	8	5	0	3		6	5	1	0
2016	13th	3	1	0	2		6	5	0	1
2018	9th	6	3	0	3		6	6	0	0
/ 2020	8th	6	2	1	3		Cancelled
// 2022	3rd	8	5	0	3		Qualified as co-host
// 2024	Qualified						6	6	0	0
//// 2026	TBD						TBD
// 2028
Total		38	22	1	15	36	30	2	4

Roster for the 2023 World Women's Handball Championship.[2][3]

Head coach: Bojana Popović

No. Pos. Name Date of birth (age) Height App. Goals Club 1 GK Marina Rajčić (1993-08-24) 24 August 1993 1.78 m 162 4 CS Măgura Cisnădie 2 RW Anastasija Marsenić (2004-02-24) 24 February 2004 1.72 m 13 24 ŽRK Budućnost 10 CB Matea Pletikosić (1998-04-24) 24 April 1998 1.68 m 54 92 CSM Corona Brașov 11 P Ivana Godeč (2001-05-11) 11 May 2001 1.77 m 24 22 ŽRK Budućnost 12 GK Armelle Attingré (1989-01-15) 15 January 1989 1.74m 7 0 ŽRK Budućnost 13 LW Dijana Mugoša (1995-10-22) 22 October 1995 1.69 m 59 121 SCM Craiova 15 RB Jelena Vukčević (2004-12-11) 11 December 2004 1.78 m 3 2 ŽRK Budućnost 21 LB Nada Ćorović (2000-12-16) 16 December 2000 1.84 m 14 4 ESBF Besançon 22 LB Andrijana Popović (2002-04-20) 20 April 2002 1.85 m 25 3 ŽRK Budućnost 24 RB Tanja Ivanović (1996-11-05) 5 November 1996 1.82 m 24 25 ŽRK Budućnost 25 RB Đurđina Malović (1996-05-05) 5 May 1996 1.82 m 51 69 SCM Craiova 26 CB Nataša Ćorović (1999-05-07) 7 May 1999 1.70 m 28 7 BSV Sachsen Zwickau 33 GK Anastasija Babović (2000-12-13) 13 December 2000 1.82 m 25 1 ŽRK Budućnost 34 P Tatjana Brnović (1998-11-09) 9 November 1998 1.84 m 76 198 RK Krim 37 RW Nina Bulatović (1996-12-09) 9 December 1996 1.72 m 31 40 CS Gloria Bistrița-Năsăud 43 GK Marta Batinović (1990-04-20) 20 April 1990 1.84 m 39 1 CS Măgura Cisnădie 71 P Bobana Klikovac (1995-07-19) 19 July 1995 1.81 m 49 42 CSM Corona Brașov 80 LB Jelena Despotović (1994-04-30) 30 April 1994 1.83 m 112 178 ŽRK Budućnost 91 LW Ivona Pavićević (1996-04-21) 21 April 1996 1.67 m 84 117 ŽRK Budućnost 96 CB Itana Grbić (1996-09-01) 1 September 1996 1.69 m 103 229 RK Krim

• Head Coach: Bojana Popović
• Assistant Coach: Maja Savić
• Fitness Coach:
• Goalkeeping Coach: Mirjana Milenković
• Physiotherapist: Andrija Damjanović
• Physiotherapist: Mitar Vujović
• Physiotherapist: Anđelka Lekić
• Head of Delegation: Arijan Efović

Since independence, Montenegro has been led by six different coaches. During the first years, the head coach was Nikola Petrović. After Petrović, Montenegro was led by Gyula Zsiga and then by Dragan Adžić, who was the most successful head coach.

Coach	From	To	Record*					Championship
			M	W	D	L	Win %
Nikola Petrović	2006	2008	11	8	0	3	072.73	None
Gyula Zsiga	2008	2010	13	10	2	1	076.92	None
Dragan Adžić	2010	2017	92	59	5	28	064.13	EC 2010 (6th); WC 2011 (10th); OG 2012 (2nd); EC 2012 (1st); WC 2013 (11th); EC 2014 (4th); WC 2015 (8th); OG 2016 (11th); EC 2016 (13th)
Per Johansson	2017	2020	30	21	1	8	070.00	WC 2017 (6th); EC 2018 (9th); WC 2019 (5th)
Kim Rasmussen	2020	2021	8	3	2	3	037.50	EC 2020 (8th)
Bojana Popović	2021		31	15	0	16	048.39	OG 2020 (6th); WC 2021 (22nd), EC 2022 (3rd), WC 2023 (7th),

* Data are only for official matches (qualifiers, European Championship, World Championship, Olympic Games).