Barca breeze into last eight

Barcelona booked their place in the VELUX EHF Champions League Quarter-finals with a comfortable aggregate success against Aalborg, following a 29:22 second-leg win on Sunday.

VELUX EHF Champions League Last 16 

FC Barcelona (ESP) vs Aalborg Handball (DEN) 29:22 (14:9)

First leg 31:11; Aggregate 60:33

Barcelona’s 20-goal annihilation of Aalborg in the away leg rendered Sunday’s return at Palau Blaugrana a mere formality – and this was reflected in the intensity of the contest.

The Danish side arrived in Spain with the intention of improving on their previous showing and did so, to a degree, reducing the margin of defeat to seven goals.

But they could not prevent the Catalans from controlling the game from the outset, jumping to an eight-goal edge in the opening period before Aalborg hit back.

It would not be enough, however, as even without hitting top gear, the hosts moved nine goals in front after half-time before cruising to a seven-goal success.

Left wing Gudjon Valur Sigurdsson scored six goals for Barcelona while Emil Berggren paced the visitors’ effort with five.