After the 35-25 (19-15) friendly victory on Wednesday evening and the photo shoot at the training premises in Brackel on Thursday, the BVB women's handballers will board the team bus to their training camp in Denmark on Sunday. The agenda until the following Saturday, 12 August, will include numerous training sessions and three pre-season friendlies against top-tier Danish teams.

The week-long training camp in the southern Danish town of Skærbæk, which comes five weeks before the opening game of the Bundesliga season at home to VfL Oldenburg on 9 September, is an important element of BVB head coach Henk Groener's planning. "BVB have already been there in recent years and have had good experiences in Skærbæk. Everything that we need is on site," explained the former coach of the Dutch and German national teams prior to departure.

Skærbæk is located directly across from the holiday island of Rømø, only 60 kilometres from the border with Germany. The training conditions are perfect, according to Groener. The players will stay in bungalows in groups of four.

The programme is ambitious. Three matches against Danish top-tier teams Ringkobing, Aarhus and Horsens are planned. Plus up to two training sessions per day. "After all, we have five new signings and we still have to find our feet. But we're looking forward to the three strong opponents from Denmark," said the coach.

It all starts on Monday – only 24 hours after arriving in Denmark – with a match against Ringkøbing Håndbold. A day later, the team from Aarhus will pay a visit to the BVB training camp. The Black & Yellows will then head to Horsens on Thursday 10 August. Throw-off is at 17:00 CET each time.

BVB will take their entire team to Denmark, with players from the second team also among the travelling contingent. Athletics coach Tobias Salewski, who is on duty with the DHB, is the only member of the coaching staff who will be absent.

Even though Groener naturally cannot draw any conclusions from the first training sessions and the friendly match against Solingen-Gräfrath, his first impressions have been good. The aim is to work not only on handball matters and fitness in Denmark, but on the mental side too. "This week is important, we have to gel with each other," said Groener. In order to provide optimal support to the three new goalkeepers Tess Lieder, Sarah Wachter and Nora Kothen, goalkeeping coach Clara Woltering will also travel to Denmark for the week-long training camp.