Start of the Exams

Hungarian MKB Veszprém was off to a great start into the VELUX EHF Champions League with a confident 8 goals victory over the Slovakian champions Tatran Presov. That is history for coach Lajos Mocsai, as the upcoming match against Hamburg will be a „university exam" to him.

eurohandball.com: What is your opinion of your last opponent, Tatran Presov?

Lajos Mocsai: Presov has many players on an equally good playing level. They are continuously developing and taking advantage of playing in the Hungarian League, where they can practise against strong teams. The Slovakians have also proved to be able to defeat Hungarian top teams like Tatabánya or Szeged on several occasions.

eurohandball.com: Were you satisfied your team’s performance against them?

Lajos Mocsai: I’m happy as we were well-prepared against this tactical and organized team. It’s also joyful that we could surprise them in all phases of the game. That’s why we were able to work our way to a comfortable 8-10 goals lead already at an early stage. In the last 15 minutes that gave me the possibility to open the door to players who were on the bench.

eurohandball.com: Did that match give you enough confidence for Saturday’s clash with Hamburg?

Lajos Mocsai: It’s like at the university: lectures and learning periods are followed by exams. The following three matches can be seen as big exams to my reorganized team. And that is hard, as we are working gradually. On the one hand we are playing only for some weeks, but we would need a half or maybe a whole season to integrate our promising youth players.

eurohandball.com: How would you characterize the Germans?

Lajos Mocsai: There are only a few teams in the world, who could beat any opponent, both on home and away court. I would say HSV Hamburg is among these elite teams. They have World and Olympic champions in their squad, and also players from the top national teams. So it’s not a surprise that Hamburg is an influential team on the top of the Bundesliga. I expect a really hard fight, but I hope we can keep this game open. I will at this occasion see a lot of familiar faces, for example trainer Martin Schwalb, who I have met on the court on several occasions during the ten years I worked as a Bundesliga coach.

The game between MKB Veszprém KC (HUN) and HSV Hamburg (GER) will be broadcasted live on our free of charge web stream on ehfTV.com an Saturday, 2 October 2010 at 17:25 hrs (GMT+2).