Perfect day for Spanish clubs

The Spanish trio play dominant on Saturday: As Barcelona remain spotless after beating Sävehof they lead their group like Atletico Madrid. The Spanish runners-up played absolutely perfect against MKB Veszprem. Reale Ademar Leon won the second Spanish-Hungarian duel against Pick Szeged. Fourth winner of the Saturday’s matches in Round 3 of the VELUX EHF Champions League was Chambery Savoie.

Group A:

After Zagreb had taken a highly close victory at Schaffhausen on Thursday Barcelona and Chambery followed the Croats.

FC Barcelona Intersport (ESP) vs. IK Sävehof (SWE) 36:24 (17:12)

Expectedly the defending champions took their third victory in the third round and remain on top of group A – together with RK CO Zagreb. Sävehof are still waiting for their first points.

Constantly the Catalans increased the gap from an early 10:5 to the halftime result of 17:12 to 28:17 in the middle of the second half – with nearly all players scoring. Those nine goals were the biggest margin in this one-sided match.

Top scorers were Aguirrezabalaga with seven goals for the dominant host and Larsson and Friden who each scored five times for Sävehof.

Bosna BH Gas Sarajevo (BIH) vs. Chambery Savoie (FRA) 18:25 (9:14)

It was a historic day for Chambery – as it was their first away victory in theVELUX EHF Champions League since nearly three years. And the win was absolutely well-deserved, as the French runners-up was classes better than the host.

After Bosna had taken an early lead Chambery goalkeeper Cyril Dumoulin and Cedric Paty, who scored five goals from five attempts before the break, turned the game – and brought the Frenchmen a quite comfortable 14:9 lead after 30 minutes.

Dumoulin who replaced Bosnian Nebojsa Grahovac, was the clear match winner of the second half, too, as Bosna failed against him very often, especially as the margin was only three goals in the beginning of the second half.

With four points Chambery have a cushion for the upcoming matches – and can even blow it up by beating Schaffhausen in Round 4. Bosna still wait for their first points.

Group B:

BM Atletico Madrid (ESP) vs. MKB Veszprem (HUN) 37:28 (17:15)

Atletico Madrid have learnt their lesson from the draw against Chekhovski Medvedi and clashed MKB Veszprem thanks to a brilliant second half, cheered by nearly 5000 spectators. The Spaniards took back the lead in the group with now five points ahead of Vezprem (4).

One key to success was the individual defence against Veszprem’s top star Marko Vujin – but despite this man-to-man defence the Serbian scored six times.

Although former Veszprem goalkeeper Arpad Sterbik showed some great saves for Madrid, his team was only able to increase the gap from the 10:9 on – but at the break the game was still open.

But thanks to three straight goals to 20:15 Madrid took control of the game, as Veszprem could not break the Spanish defence anymore. One counter attack followed the next – and then the game latest was decided at the score of 30:21, even as Veszprem goalkeeper Mirko Allilovic saved in total 14 shots. Best scorer for Atlerico was Jonas Källman with five goals.

The final result was an unexpected clear one, showing that Atletico have the strength to beat all top opponents in their group.

Statements after the match:

Lajos Mocasi (coach MKB Veszprem): Atletico Madrid have played much better than my team and deserved to win, as we have made too many mistakes.

Peter Gulyas (player MKB Veszprem): Losing too many balls was the key to this defeat.

Talant Dushebajew (coach BM Atletico Madrid): I am happy for my team and their effort against one of the best teams in Europe. We must go on like this.

Mariusz Jurkiewicz (player BM Atletico Madrid): We have been concentrated until the lastminute – and we won as we did not make the mistakes we had done against Chekhovskie Medvedi.

Group D:

Pick Szeged (HUN) vs. Reale Ademar Leon (ESP) 31:35 (16:16)

Even ten goals of Slowak international Frantisek Sulc did not bring the first victory for the Hungarian runners-up. Leon remain in good position with four points after three matches.

Thanks to Sulc, Pick led 12:9, but when he became weaker at the end of the first period, Leon equalized at the break. And the saves of Ademar goalkeeper Venio Loser gave the most important advantage to the guest which increased the margin decisively to 25:19.

But the game became narrow again, as Szeged tried all and reduced the gap to 26:28, before again Losert decided the match in the final stage. Another match winner for the Spaniards was another Slowak: wing player Martin Stranowsky scored nine goals.

Statements after the match:

Martin Isidora Martinez (coach Ademar Leon): We didn’t start very well. After we had changed the right back our performance improved. In the second half our goalkeeper was very good- this was an important factor.

László Skaliczki (coach Pick Szeged): It was really hard to play without real backs. I would like to emphasise the very good performance of Frantisek Sulc, but I think that there was big pressure on him. We do not have too many players because of injuries, so we run out of energy faster

Venio Losert (goalkeeper Reale Ademar Leon): We knew before the start of the match that it would be a difficult fight. I believe that our performance in the last five minutes of the first half was very important and we established our leadin the first period of the second half.

József Czina (player Pick Szeged): Our performance was very good in the first half but it is really difficult to play without the right side. Gábor Ancsin is injured and Rajko Prodanovic also has problems so he could perform only 50 per cent. Unfortunately I received a red card- I feel really sorry about this because I think that at that time we had a good period.