New-look Zagreb aiming for giddy heights

Once a force to be reckoned with in European club handball, Croatian champions HC Croatia Osiguranje Zagreb have had to come to terms with being nothing more than dark horses in the VELUX EHF Champions League since they twice won the continent’s premier club competition and finished as runners-up four times in the 1990s.

The nine-times Yugoslav champions, who went on to win all 22 league titles and 20 national cups after Croatia gained independence, have struggled to match those achievements in the last decade as their rivals grew stronger while lack of competition at home slowed down their own progress.

With many of their tried and tested stalwarts gone to ply their trade elsewhere during the summer break, it seems that even more challenging times lie ahead for Zagreb. However, their coach Slavko Goluža, who is also in charge of the Croatian national team, expressed confidence his youthful new-look team would be able to slug it out with Europe’s best in due course.

“This team packed with young players needs support and it’s up to the senior players to lead by example,” Goluža told Croatian media after losing the likes of Ivano Balić, Jakov Gojun, Marko Kopljar, Manuel Štrlek and several others to wealthier opposition.

“I can guarantee that this will be a fit and combative team and I know that if we are fully committed to the cause, we can give everyone a good run for their money like we did in previous season’s Last 16 clash against THW Kiel, who went on to win the competition,” he said.

Winger Zlatko Horvat and Lovro Šprem remain the familiar faces standing out in a pack of upcoming prospects and the club’s president Zoran Gobac pointed out that relying on youngsters would be the club’s policy from now on in testing financial circumstances.

“We’ve had to cut costs and make a policy shift in order to stay afloat and what we hope to do is build on our current annual budget of about three million euro to make it five million in the next four-year term,” he said.

“That would enable us to compete with Europe’s best teams and the main objective of this new project is to reach the Final4 in two or three year’s time, as we hope to sign some quality players and boost our squad when the time is right.”

Zagreb were drawn in a competitive group including the likes of former winners Barcelona, Füchse Berlin and Hungarian campaigners PICK Szeged, meaning that they will have to play on top of their limits to emulate last season’s accomplishment of reaching the knock-out stage of the highly entertaining money-spinning competition.

“Next term’s ambitions are to win the domestic league and cup double, do as well as we can in the regional SEHA league and reach the Last 16 in the Champions League because it’s going to be a transitional season. We are up against Szeged in our opening Champions League match and collecting four points from the opening three games would be good tally because it’s a very tough group,” Gobac said in conclusion.

Further information

Find more information on Zagreb HERE.
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