For the second time in history, Poland men’s senior national team will have a foreign coach, after Jota González was named in this position, following the ending of the tenure of the previous coach, Marcin Lijewski in February 2025.

The 53-year-old Spanish coach, who will lead Poland until 2028, has been unveiled in a press conference by the Polish Handball Federation (ZPRP) on Tuesday, 15 April.

"We are very pleased to announce the signing of a contract with the new coach of the Polish national handball team. Jota González is a coach with extensive experience in working with senior teams, but also in working with youth. We believe that he will bring new energy and new ideas to the team, and will open doors for talented players and effectively introduce them to the senior team. I am sure that the new coach will also help the more experienced representatives to develop their full potential, and then we can build a team together ready to fight at the highest level," said Sławomir Szmal, the ZPRP President.

Jota González – born Jesús Javier González Fernández – has an extensive track record as a coach, starting dipping his toes into assistant coaching, where he worked under Juan Carlos Pastor, the former Egypt men’s senior team coach,  as well as Raul González, serving as the latter’s assistant between 2018 and 2023 at Paris Saint-Germain Handball.

González was twice named as the Coach of the Year in the Spanish league, in 2011 and 2013, while he was leading CBM Logroño La Rioja, where he spent 11 years, between 2007 and 2018, securing the second place behind Barcelona in 2014, 2015 and 2016.

“My philosophy will be hard to see in the Polish national team's game from the very beginning, because it requires a lot of training and fine-tuning of many details. I focus on open play, a fast combination attack with many tactical solutions. I would like my team to have many options in every situation. The defense should not only be aggressive, but above all intelligent and by anticipating the opponents' moves it should cause them big problems. To achieve this, you need to analyze well and have a lot of knowledge about your opponents,”  said González, according to the official website of the ZPRP.

González, who is currently coaching Portuguese side SL Benfica, has a mathematical education and taught mathematics at the University of Valladolid.

The first official matches for González in his new posiition will come in May, where the Spanish coach will look to secure wins against Israel and Romania, in the EHF EURO 2026 Qualifiers, where Poland need at least one win to secure their place in the competition.

Since 2015, when they secured a bronze medal at the IHF Men’s World Championship, Poland have finished 13th in 2017, missed out on qualification in 2019, and then ended up on the 13th place in 2021, 15th place in 2023, when they were co-hosts, and 25th at Croatia/Denmark/Norway 2025.

Credit photo: Polish Handball Federation