Morphological and Physical Performance-Related Characteristics of Elite Male Handball Players: The Influence of Age and Playing Position

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

   I have now completed my review of the paper entitled “Anthropometric and Physical performance-related Measures of Elite Male Handball Players: The Influence of Age and Playing Position". This research provides useful data for talent identification of handball players. However, the current version merely presents values of physical fitness parameters and seems like "materials" or "data" rather than "articles". I feel that this paper needs some academic development before it can be accepted as an "original article". Therefore, I consider the current manuscript to be a major revision.

 

*** Introduction, Discussion，Conclusion***

1. The first paragraph of the introduction contains information about the state of play of handball in the world. Is this part necessary? Rather, I believe that a more detailed description of the role of each position in handball (including the physical fitness components required) would lead to the purpose of this study.

 

2. The introduction should include hypothesis. For example, please explain what parameters need to be measured, including a talent identification perspective. The current manuscript states that "highly-developed muscular power, speed, high-intensity running endurance, agility and ball throwing velocity " are important. In other words, the reader will feel that "all the physical fitness components are important".

 

3. The authors have pointed out the issue of sample size of previous studies, but what exactly is the sample size required?

 

4. The title includes "Anthropometric" parameters, but the introduction does not mention the importance of Anthropometric parameters. What anthropometric parameters should be investigated? This study only measures height, weight, and body composition, which seems insufficient for anthropometric evaluation (does it not include limb length, somatotypes, etc.?). "Anthropometric" is used in the title, but the purpose of the study in the introduction is "morphological".

 

5. Although the study focuses on Slovenian national team members, what is the level of the Slovenian national team in international perspective? 

 

6. Overall, I feel that most of the discussion should be explained in the Introduction. Then, the discussion should develop into what specific physical fitness components need to be acquired for which positions and at what ages in talent identification. The reader will be unable to understand from the current manuscript what parameters should be measured and evaluated in the actual field. Will each instructor select the necessary parameters based on the results of this study? Therefore, the current version seems to be a "material" rather than an "article".

 

7. Although the authors mention about recovery from illness and injury in the discussion and conclusion, I feel that this cannot be discussed based on this study results.

 

8. In relation to the discussion, please specifically state in the conclusion which physical fitness parameters are important for position-specific talent identification.

 

***Methodological problem***

1. Body composition measured by the BIA method requires the consideration of various factors (https://inbodyusa.com/general/inbody-test/). How did the authors control for these factors?

 

2. Is the assessment of bone mass by the BIA method validated? Especially, this study includes younger participants.

 

3. (Related to the introduction point) Please indicate why the authors have chosen these physical fitness parameters. The author states in the introduction that "agility and ball throwing velocity" are also required, but these indices are not included. There are also basic physical fitness parameters such as muscle strength and flexibility. Why are these not included?

 

4. Please indicate the order of measurement. Depending on the order, some parameters may not demonstrate their "maximum capability".

 

5. Backcourt has a larger number of players because it includes the center and the left and right sides. Can the center and left or right be considered as the same group?

Author Response

 RESPONSE:

 

Dear reviewer,

I am very grateful for the opportunity to revise this manuscript. I appreciate your efforts. I feel that several important points in our earlier submission were identified to be revisited, and as a result of these revisions, the manuscript is now a much clearer article. I have addressed each issue raised, listed point by point below. All corrections are marked with green colour throughout the document. Therefore, I hope that the revisions in the manuscript and my accompanying responses will be sufficient for this manuscript to be suitable for publication.

 

*** Introduction, Discussion，Conclusion***

1. The first paragraph of the introduction contains information about the state of play of handball in the world. Is this part necessary? Rather, I believe that a more detailed description of the role of each position in handball (including the physical fitness components required) would lead to the purpose of this study.

RESPONSE: Dear, we agree on the point made here, so we amended introduction chapter as requested.

 

2. The introduction should include hypothesis. For example, please explain what parameters need to be measured, including a talent identification perspective. The current manuscript states that "highly-developed muscular power, speed, high-intensity running endurance, agility and ball throwing velocity " are important. In other words, the reader will feel that "all the physical fitness components are important".

RESPONSE: We amended this point accordingly. Please see P2; L – 61-90.

 

3. The authors have pointed out the issue of sample size of previous studies, but what exactly is the sample size required?

RESPONSE:

Dear reviewer, thank you for your question on this issue. Previous studies lack of large sample size in sense that they were unable to present results of goalkeepers or divide players on several positions. In hence, we present the data coupled over 15 years, allowing us to do so. The correct sample size calculation matric is hard to argue for the cross-sectional study aimed to present a normative data of a single population, and we agree with this.

 

4. The title includes "Anthropometric" parameters, but the introduction does not mention the importance of Anthropometric parameters. What anthropometric parameters should be investigated? This study only measures height, weight, and body composition, which seems insufficient for anthropometric evaluation (does it not include limb length, somatotypes, etc.?). "Anthropometric" is used in the title, but the purpose of the study in the introduction is "morphological".

 

RESPONSE: Dear, we agree on this point as we did not measure whole body anthropometry, but rather we were focused on stature (body height and weight) and body composition (FM and FFM). Thus, we decided to use term “morphological” through the manuscript and also, use a phrase “selected morphological characteristics”.

 

 

5. Although the study focuses on Slovenian national team members, what is the level of the Slovenian national team in international perspective? 

 RESPONSE: We amended this accordingly. Please see: P2; L-76-83

 

6. Overall, I feel that most of the discussion should be explained in the Introduction. Then, the discussion should develop into what specific physical fitness components need to be acquired for which positions and at what ages in talent identification. The reader will be unable to understand from the current manuscript what parameters should be measured and evaluated in the actual field. Will each instructor select the necessary parameters based on the results of this study? Therefore, the current version seems to be a "material" rather than an "article".

 RESPONSE: We amended this accordingly. Please see introduction and discussion chapters.

 

 

7. Although the authors mention about recovery from illness and injury in the discussion and conclusion, I feel that this cannot be discussed based on this study results.

 RESPONSE: Since we agree on this point, we have deleted the reference to the effects of our results on recovery from illness and injury

 

8. In relation to the discussion, please specifically state in the conclusion which physical fitness parameters are important for position-specific talent identification.

 RESPONSE: We amended this accordingly. Please see: P13; L-325-34

 

***Methodological problem***

1. Body composition measured by the BIA method requires the consideration of various factors (https://inbodyusa.com/general/inbody-test/). How did the authors control for these factors?

RESPONSE: The participants were instructed to follow manufacturers preparation instructions before the assessment including all the factors you mentioned https://inbodyusa.com/general/inbody-test. The same procedures are followed for all measurement assessments including physical performance measures, so this is not something that should be especially pointed out in this section. Therefore, we mentioned this in the “Participants” section. Please see:

 

 

 

2. Is the assessment of bone mass by the BIA method validated? Especially, this study includes younger participants.

RESPONSE: We agree with you on this issue. As the results, we removed these data from the results section.

 

 

3. (Related to the introduction point) Please indicate why the authors have chosen these physical fitness parameters. The author states in the introduction that "agility and ball throwing velocity" are also required, but these indices are not included. There are also basic physical fitness parameters such as muscle strength and flexibility. Why are these not included?

 

RESPONSE: Dear, this project was launched in 2007. At that time, we did not have devices to measure the speed of ball throwing. On the other hand, the force measurements were not routinely evaluated because they are time-consuming for mass measurements. So, we do not have this data and therefore changed the introduction and study limitation sections accordingly.

 

4. Please indicate the order of measurement. Depending on the order, some parameters may not demonstrate their "maximum capability".

RESPONSE: Dear, thank you for this note. The measurements were conducted by the same order as they appear in the text. For better understanding of the methodology, we clarified this issue in the first paragraph of the “Procedures” section.

 

5. Backcourt has a larger number of players because it includes the center and the left and right sides. Can the center and left or right be considered as the same group?

RESPONSE: Dear, thank you for this note. We had this dilemma; however, we decided to use current classification based on vast amount of previously published literature (appended bellow) that considered only four positions, so we can compare obtained results between studies. Although we followed a previous publications on the similar topic, we agree it would be interesting to include all 7 positions, because there is an justified assumption that left and right wingers or backcourt players (left, central or right) might differ in their characteristics.

• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23591948/ - no position comparisons at al
• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26839626/ - no position comparisons at al
• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27139799/ - 4 positions only
• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28085131/ - 4 positions only
• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26898059/ - 4 positions only
• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31294019/ - pivots, wings and backs without goalkeepers

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Authors,

I read your manuscript with interest and I would like to share some suggestions.

1) In "Material and Methods" section I suggest providing data concerning general training loads in particular age categories (e.g. number of training sessions per week, number of training hours). This information would enrich the interpretation of athletes' physical performance.

2) The description of cardiorespiratory fitness test should be provided in the current manuscript ("Materials and Methods" section), regardless of your previous publications.

3) I suggest writing "playing position*age category" instead of "PP*AC" in Tables 2-4. I believe that mode of writing is more understandable for the readers.

4) The first paragraph of the "Discussion" section seems to duplicate information provided in the "Results" section. Please think about re-writing this paragraph.

5) Considering the tendency of avoiding unjustifiable self-citations, I suggest removing reference no. 3. There are some other studies of the current topic that may be cited, for example: Martinez-Rodriguez et al. Body composition characteristics of handball players: systematic review. Arch Med Deporte 2020 or  Ghobadi et al. Anthropometry of world-class elite handball players... J Hum Kinet 2013.

 

Author Response

RESPONSE:

 

Dear reviewer,

I am very grateful for the opportunity to revise this manuscript. I appreciate your efforts. I feel that several important points in our earlier submission were identified to be revisited, and as a result of these revisions, the manuscript is now a much clearer article. I have addressed each issue raised, listed point by point below. All corrections are marked with green colour throughout the document. Therefore, I hope that the revisions in the manuscript and my accompanying responses will be sufficient for this manuscript to be suitable for publication.

 

1) In "Material and Methods" section I suggest providing data concerning general training loads in particular age categories (e.g. number of training sessions per week, number of training hours). This information would enrich the interpretation of athletes' physical performance.

RESPONSE: Dear, thank you for your constructive comment. We amended this issue accordingly by adding these data in Table 1.

2) The description of cardiorespiratory fitness test should be provided in the current manuscript ("Materials and Methods" section), regardless of your previous publications.

RESPONSE: Dear, thank you for your note. We amended this issue accordingly by providing detailed description of 30-15IFT test. Please see: P4, L-157-74

 

3) I suggest writing "playing position*age category" instead of "PP*AC" in Tables 2-4. I believe that mode of writing is more understandable for the readers.

RESPONSE: We amended this accordingly. Please see tables 2,3 and 4

4) The first paragraph of the "Discussion" section seems to duplicate information provided in the "Results" section. Please think about re-writing this paragraph.

RESPONSE: We amended this accordingly. Please see: P10; L-232-238

5) Considering the tendency of avoiding unjustifiable self-citations, I suggest removing reference no. 3. There are some other studies of the current topic that may be cited, for example: Martinez-Rodriguez et al. Body composition characteristics of handball players: systematic review. Arch Med Deporte 2020 or  Ghobadi et al. Anthropometry of world-class elite handball players... J Hum Kinet 2013.

RESPONSE: We amended this accordingly

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript has been much improved and I think this manuscript will be of interest to readers working with handball coaching.