Ciudad Real take the title with away victory

Though everything seemed to be prepared for a great party, the supporters of THW Kiel left the Sparkassen Arena with tears in their eyes. Ciudad Real were able to endure the pressure of a completely sold-out hall and reached a sensational result. After losing the first leg on home court by 27:29 they won the second leg in the “lion's cave” by 31:25 (15:13).

As the Kiel players fell on the floor at the final whistle, the Spanish team celebrated their second CL title after 2006.

Kiel were too nervous at the beginning and too weak in attack throughout the game. On the other end of the court there was a real hero, goalkeeper Árpád Sterbik who showed an incredible performance.

In addition, the two top scorers of Ciudad Real, Olafur Stefansson and Jonas Kallman, 23 goals combined, were the decisive. The best scorer of Kiel was Vid Kavticnik with eight goals.

While THW Kiel were able to play with their complete squad, Ciudad Real had to replace key players: David Davis and Siarhei Rutenka were injured, just as Petar Metlicic. Line player, Rolando Urios, also stayed on the bench for most of the match.

Dominating guests

The first half was marked by two strong defences and the Spanish team started better as Kiel missed the first four chances of the game including a penalty shot.

The 2006 winners took a 6:3 and 7:4 lead by the time THW coach Noka Serdarusic took his time-out.

Kiel seemed to have regained confidence when they equalised for the first time at 9:9. The Germans even went 12:10 up with great saves from goalkeeper Thierry Omeyer.

Despite the improving host side Ciudad – led by an outstanding Icelandic, Olafur Stefansson - fought back: three Kiel mistakes, three Ciudad goals and the Spaniards went into the cabin with a 15:13 lead. Goalkeeper Árpád Sterbik improved after a better start of his counterpart Omeyer.

After the break Sterbik ”closed the goal”, saved five consecutive shots (24 saves in the game) – but his team could not take their chances to increase the gap to more than three goals as also Omeyer showed his class.

Without the Frenchman, Kiel would have lost the game much earlier. But in the 38th minute Jonas Kallman scored his sixth goal and the 18:14 was already telling...

The hall was silenced and the chances of THW decreased with every minute as they did not have ideas and game plans to break through the Ciudad defence and beat Sterbik.

THW could still hope when they scored to make it 22:25, and they were only one goal from heaven. But as the next three attacks weren’t successful and Ciudad scored three times in a row, the match was practically over at 22:27 (55th minute).

Though the 10.250 fans were shouting and supporting their team, Kiel failed against a goalkeeper, who is probably the best in the world.

At 19:39 PM on Sunday evening the dream of THW Kiel ended. Ciudad Real won the match by 31:25 to take their second CL title of their history.