Nagy: We cannot sit back and enjoy success

Hi there!

What’s up, handball fans? I hope you are all doing well!

It’s been a long time since I last posted in my blog and naturally a lot of things happened in the meantime. As you may remember we were in Cologne for the first time and although we finished fourth participating in the VELUX EHF Final4 only made us hungry for more.

This year promises to be a great one, too.

Captain off the deck

You don’t catch me in my best mood I must admit. I have been injured for almost six weeks now and for a professional athlete there is nothing more taxing than watching your team from the bench. I would have loved to play in front of the Skopje crowd last week but there was no point risking.

I am not a sissy guy, as far as I can recall I have only been injured (apart from some minor troubles) a couple of times. A broken finger and a fist and that’s all.

Some may think being injured is like a vacation for us, however, the truth is that recovery takes out a lot more from an athlete than regular trainings. Therapies, doctor’s appointments, physio, cardio and so on… Don’t envy me, I tell you!

Captain’s duties

Last season was great but you can’t just sit back and enjoy success. We have one of the best supporters in the world who constantly demand improvement and since we are in the most difficult group of the VELUX EHF Champions League we do need to get better and better to achieve our goals. After five rounds we are still unbeaten so we can say that we do our job, right?

We have some new players and – having spent almost a decade in Barcelona – I know how hard it is to settle in a new place, learn your way around, test your skills in foreing languages. As team captain I felt called upon to help the new guys fit in but they didn’t need much help from me: Andreas Nilsson and Christian Zeitz settled in pretty quickly, not to mention Roland Mikler, who knew most of his Hungarian teammates from the national team.

I like to think of us as an open and receptive lot. I think we do everything we can to make it easier for new guys to settle down and feel at home in Veszprém.

Cologne calling

Our aim for this year has not changed: we want to play in the FINAL4 again. I heared that the experts in the EHF Google Hangout all consider us favourites to reach the Cologne event I know how hard it will be to get there.

The VELUX EHF Champions League is an extremely balanced race, I could name 6-7 teams who have almost equal chance to lift the trophy. I have nothing but respect for the experts at ehfcl.com but did any of them pick Flensburg as winners last year? Or Hamburg a year before? That is the beauty of sport: the last two editions were won by teams no-one considered as favourites.

In such a prestigious contest there is no underdog, nor there is a favourite.

Family gives me strength

I love to spend time with my family but now that I am injured I have even less time to be with them. That means we cherish the little time we have and try to make the best out of it. Budapest has a lot of nice restaurants and we love to eat out as much as we can.

In the afternoons we would take our dog for a walk but unfortunately he passed away. We were all heartbroken, especially my daughter Debora who now has a new friend. We bought a chiwawa puppy and the walks are once more back on every afternoon.

But can you imagine me walking with a chiwawa puppy? Yes, funny.

That’s it for now, friends. I hope you enjoyed, stay tuned for more!

Yours,

Laci