National champions women - part 4: eastern Europe

Based on the current European Cup ranking, only the 19 best national leagues will provide teams for the 2013/14 Women's EHF Champions League season. In five parts, ehfCL.com shines the spotlight on each of the teams who qualified for the next edition of Europe's top flight and their race for the ticket in their respective national competitions.

The fourth part is dedicated to teams from eastern Europe - Russia, Romania, Belarus and Turkey.

RUSSIA

Dinamo Volgograd extended their rule over the Russian Superleague to five years but their path for the eleventh title in the club's history was rather thorny. After the regular season they finished only fourth and only narrowly sailed past Astrakhanochka in the quarter-final. Following the elimination of the top seeded Zvezda Zvenigorod in the semi-final, only the last match of the final best-of-three series in Rostov decided the title. As Dinamo have not been confirmed for the EHF Champions League, the sole Russian representative will be the runners-up Rostov, who finished second after 16 rounds of the regular season and powered through Luch Moscow and Lada Togliatti to the final.

ROMANIA

20 wins from 20 matches in the Romanian league was a swan song for Oltchim Vâlcea who easily clinched their 19th national title. As the semi-finalists of the previous EHF Champions League season have not entered the list of participants for the 2013/14 season, meaning the only Romanian club in the best continental club competition will be Baia Mare who finished ten points behind Oltchim in the final league standings. For Baia Mare it will be their first ever participation among best of the best after several seasons in other European Cup competitions.

BELARUS

At the expense of Slovakian champions Belarus earned a place in the EHF Champions League and BNTU BelAZ Minsk can carry on where they finish at their last trip in the qualification six years ago. BNTU won their fifth Belarusian double in a row adding the cup trophy to the national championship title. In 20 rounds they suffered only three defeats, but they clinched the title only in the very last round as they beat their fiercest rivals Gorodnichanka Grodno 18:15.

TURKEY

Muratpasa Belediyesi Spor Antalya marched to their maiden national title with an impressive fashion as they completed an unbeaten run of 18 matches in the Turkish Superleague. The only team Muratpasa failed to beat were the defending champions Üsküdar BSK as these rivals tied on both occassions in the season.