Dinamo dictate proceedings to take opening victory

Russian champions Dinamo-Sinara got their Women’s EHF Champions League campaign off to the perfect start with a result which never seemed in doubt against Leipzig, who failed to recapture the form which saw them qualify for the group matches

Women’s EHF Champions League Group A

Dinamo-Sinara (RUS) vs HC Leipzig (GER) 27:19 (16:10)

The match started in a frantic fashion. Both teams were aggressive in attack and we saw seven goals in less than 5 minutes (5:2 to Dinamo). The Russian defence also improved quickly and it was 10:3 with 10 minutes gone.

Leipzig employed a 5+1 defence with a player stuck to the dangerous Daria Dmitrieva (eight goals in the first half, nine in total). 

That proved useful and the visitors came back to 11:8 eight minutes later. Unfortunately for them, they made error after error in attack. In addition, the home goalkeeper Anna Sedoykina came into form with eight saves (15 saves total). Dinamo exploited that and extended the margin to 16:10 by half-time.

After six minutes in the second half, only two goals had been scored (1:1). Afterwards, Dinamo picked up the pace and started to score, while Leipzig had a nightmare in offense. The visitors could not score, even with a player advantage, and had a 14-minute long scoring drought.

The margin slowly increased to 10 goals (22:12 in the 46th minute) and was at its biggest in the 53rd minute (23:13). In the final minutes Dinamo loosened up a little, but Leipzig could only lessen the difference.

Karolina Kudlacz top scored with 10 goals for the visitors, but her efforts were not enough for the German runners-up, who leave Russia with plenty to work on before Round 2 at home to Krim.

As for Dinamo, they head to Austria next week for a clash against Hypo Niederösterreich.