Facts and figures before the draw of the EHF Cup

It is all new in the Men’s EHF Cup: For the first time ever a Group Phase had been played, for the first time ever a final tournament, the so called EHF Cup Finals, will decide, which team will raise the trophy on 19 May in Nantes.

Six teams just have finished their quarter-finals and Rhein Neckar Löwen, Frisch Auf Göppingen (both Germany) and Team Tvis Holstebro (Denmark) have clinched their berth at the EHF Cup Finals.

Host HBC Nantes directly made it to the final tournament, as the French team were among the three best second ranked teams.

Before the draw for the EHF Cup Finals takes place on Tuesday (30 April) in Nantes (11:00 hrs local times, live stream on www.ehfTV.com), here are the most important facts and figures about the competition until now.

The road to Nantes:

The number of matches played by the four teams facing at the EHF Cup Finals ranges from eight to 12.

Team Tvis Holstebro started in the second qualification stage and have played 12 matches including qualification, Group Phase and quarter-finals (6 victories, 3 draws, 3 defeats).

Rhein Neckar Löwen and Frisch Auf Göppingen started in the third and final qualification round and have played ten matches each by now. Löwen have a record of 7 victories, 1 draw and 2 defeats, Göppingen have 8 victories, 1 draw and 1 defeat on their account.

Host Nantes only need two qualification matches and six Group Matches to reach the final destination and scored 5 victories, 1 draw and 2 defeats in those eight matches.

The quarter-finals:

Two of three quarter-finals were decided with the last shot after a total of120 minutes: Momir Rnic secured Frisch Auf Göppingen’s ticket to Nantes, scoring the final goal in the 31:30 win against Branik Maribor (after 26:26 in the first leg).

Michael Damgaard hit the net for a 27:26 Team Tvis Holstebro victory against KIF Kolding after 24:24 in the first leg.

Both encounters were decided in aggregate by only one goal (Göppingen – Maribor 57:56, Holstebro – Kolding 51:50).

The third duel of Rhein Neckar Löwen and SC Magdeburg was not that close (55:51), but Löwen needed to turn around a 28:31 away defeat, which they managed by winning 27:20 at home.

Points, points, points:

After Magdeburg lost their re-match at Rhein Neckar Löwen and were eliminated from the EHF Cup Finals, no team is unbeaten in the competition.

Although they missed the final tournament, the former EHF Champions League winners from Magdeburg still have the best statistics of all participants by 6 victories, 1 draw and 1 defeat from the start of the Group Phase onwards. Göppingen have the same statistics (6-1-1), followed by Rhein Neckar Löwen (6-0-2).

Holstebro have 4 victories, 3 draws and 1 defeat on their account after the quarter-finals. No other team drew more often than Holstebro. Nantes’ Group Phase record was 4 victories, 1 draw and 1 defeat.

Home victories, away victories, draws:

Two draws and four home victories occurred in the quarter-finals, as no team could take a victory in an away match and no team won both duels.

The overall statistics after 54 matches of the Group Phase and quarter-finals are: 33 home victories – 5 draws – 16 away victories.

In the Group Phase, the home had finished the match victorious on 29 occasions; 16 times the away teams were the winners and three matches ended with a draw.

Göppingen and Rhein Neckar Löwen have won all their respective home matches.

Goals, goals, goals

Attack:

Frisch Auf Göppingen are the best team of the four EHF Cup Finals participants concerning the attacking performance. After they had been the only participant to reach the mark of 200 goals in six Group Matches, they added 57 more in the quarter-finals to 257 (average 32.1 goals).

Rhein Neckar Löwen are second ranked by 240 goals in Group Phase and quarter-finals (average of 30.0) ahead of Holstebro (221, average of 27.6).

As Nantes only played the Group Phase, they have scored 154 goals in six games (an average of 25.6) goals.

Defence:

After SC Magdeburg had the best defence of all 16 teams after the Group Phase, now Rhein Neckar Löwen are on top regarding the final tournament participants with 201 conceded goals (an average of 25,1) after the Group Stage and quarter-finals, ahead of Holstebro (207, average 25,8) and Göppingen (231/average of 28,8). 

HBC Nantes conceded only 143 in their six Group Matches, which means an average of 23,8.

Löwen are on top again on goal difference with +39, followed by Göppingen (+26) and Holstebro (+14).

Matches with the largest number of goals:

None of the six matches of the quarter-finals are among those eight games with the biggest number of goals since the start of the Group Phase. The biggest number was scored in the Göppingen vs. Maribor encounter with 61 (31:30).

The spectators of both legs of the Group Phase encounter Frisch Auf Göppingen vs. Cimos Koper could not complain about the amount of goals, as in total 145 goals were scored in both matches and those encounters clearly lead the ranking in this department.

75 goals: Cimos Koper vs. Frisch Auf Göppingen 36:39
70 goals: Frisch Auf Göppingen vs. Cimos Koper 38:32
67 goals: Tatran Presov vs. Rhein Neckar Löwen 33:34
64 goals: Tatran Presov vs. Motor Zaporozhye 36:28
63 goals: Maribor Branik vs. Elverum Handball Herrer 34:29
63 goals: Frisch Auf Göppingen vs. Eskilstuna Guif 37:26
63 goals: Naturhouse La Rioja vs. Cimos Koper 35:28
63 goals : Frisch Auf Göppingen vs. Naturhouse La Rioja 32:31

Matches with the lowest number of goals:

Two quarter-finals matches are among those nine games with the lowest number of goals regarding Group Phase and first knock-out stage: Rhein Neckar Löwen vs. SC Magdeburg and KIF Kolding vs. Team Tvis Holstebro.

The overall lowest number of goals scored came when Bacau faced Nantes in the Group Phase, the only match with less than 40 goals by now.

39 goals: Stiinta Municipal Bacau vs. HBC Nantes  18:21  (GP)
44 goals: Besiktas Istanbul vs. SC Magdeburg 17:27 (GP)
45 goals: Besiktas Istanbul vs. HBC Nantes 21:24 (GP)
47 goals: Rhein Neckar Löwen vs. SC Magdeburg 27:20 (QF)
48 goals: KIF Kolding vs. Team Tvis Holstebro 24:24 (QF)
48 goals: Besiktas Istanbul vs. Stiinta Municipal Bacau  25:23 (GP)
48 goals: KIF Kolding vs. Rhein Neckar Löwen 25:23 (GP)
49 goals: Maribor Branik vs. Orlen Wisla Plock 26:23 (GP) 

Matches with the biggest winning margins:

Six of 54 matches of Group Phase and quarter-finals ended with a difference of more than ten goals, with the encounter KIF Kolding vs. Tatran Presov on top with the huge margin of 20 goals.

The biggest margin in a quarter-final was the 27:20 victory of Rhein Neckar Löwen against SC Magdeburg – all other five matches ended with less than four goals margin.

20 goals: KIF Kolding vs. Tatran Presov 37:17
16 goals: Rhein Neckar Löwen – Tatran Presov 36:20
15 goals: SC Magdeburg vs. Besiktas Istanbul 33:18
15 goals: team Tvis Holstebro vs. Elverum Handball Herrer 33:18
13 goals: Rhein Neckar Löwen vs. Motor Zaporozhye 35:22
10 goals: Besiktas Istanbul vs. SC Magdeburg 17:27

Top scorers after the quarter-finals (including Group Phase and quarter-finals only):

Frisch Auf Göppingen hold the top two positions on the top scorer list: Momir Rnic and Zarko Markovic, have scored 99 goals together from the start of the Group Phase until now.

51 goals: Momir Rnic (Frisch Auf Göppingen)
48 goals: Zarko Markovic (Frisch Auf Göppingen)
47 goals: Andy Schmid (Rhein Neckar Löwen)
47 goals: Nikola Spelic (Maribor Branik)
44 goals: Michael Damgaard (Team Tvis Holstebro)
42 goals: Robert Weber (SC Magdeburg)
42 goals: Miha Zarabec (Maribor Branik)
39 goals: Sergii Burka (Motor Zaporozhye)
37 goals: Mads Christiansen (Team Tvis Holstebro)
37 goals: Pavel Horak (Frisch Auf Göppingen)
37 goals: Bjarte Myrhol (Rhein Neckar Löwen)

Top 3 scorers of the four EHF Cup Finals participants:

Team Tvis Holstebro: Michael Damgaard (44), Mads Christiansen (37), Patrick Wiesmach (35)
Rhein Neckar Löwen: Andy Schmid (47), Bjarte Myrhol (37), Zarko Sesum (30)
HBC Nantes (only Group Phase): Valero Rivera jun. (30), Jorge Maqueda (21), Matthieu de la Breteche (16)
Frisch Auf Göppingen: Momir Rnic (51), Zarko Markovic (48), Pavel Horak (37)

Top 15 crowds:

Four quarter-final matches – including both Danish duels of Kolding vs. Holstebro – made it among the Top 15 regarding numbers of spectators with more than 3120 fans attending the matches each.

The Danish-German Group Phase top duel KIF Kolding, played at the Brondby Arena Kobenhavn, is still the number 1 regarding spectators, with 4749 fans attending this match.

In total, HBC Nantes was the team with the highest number of spectators in their three home matches in the Group Phase by an average of 4433 fans at their games.

4749: KIF Kolding vs. Rhein Neckar Löwen (GP)
4600: HBC Nantes vs. Besiktas Istanbul (GP)
4500: HBC Nantes vs. Bacau (GP)
4354: KIF Kolding vs. Team Tvis Holstebro (QF)
4300: Frisch Auf Göppingen vs. Branik Maribor (QF)
4200: HBC Nantes vs. SC Magdeburg (GP)
4000: Naturhouse La Rioja vs. Cimos Koper (GP)
3800: Wisla Plock vs. Team Tvis Holstebro (GP)
3600: Frisch Auf Göppingen vs. Naturhouse La Rioja (GP)
3500: Naturhouse La Rioja vs. Frisch Auf Göppingen (GP)
3350: Tatran Prtesov vs. Rhein Neckar Löwen (GP)
3342: SC Magdeburg vs. Rhein Neckar Löwen (QF)
3120: Tatran Presov vs. Motor Zaporozhye (GP)
3120: Team Tvis Holstebro vs. KIF Kolding (QF)
3100: Orlen Wisla Plock vs.Maribor Branik (GP)