27.10.2008, 10:30
Podravka and Lada open women's CL

A high quality and equal game will launch the women's competition on Friday.

Podravka and Lada open women's CL

New CL season will start in Koprivnica with the match Podravka Vegeta vs Lada. In this important duel the home team will have great support from the Croatian fans.

After successes at the qualification tournament in Estella, the Croatian champions want to continue their winning stream.

Without pressure

Coach Zdravko Zovko is satisfied with his team’s achievement:

“We have quality to compete in the CL and I would like to congratulate my players for qualifying. We have been preparing for two months for the qualification tournament in Estella and we were under great pressure. Everybody expected Podravka to play in the CL. In the group matches we will have much stronger opponents, but now we can play without pressure.”

On Saturday Podravka defeated Trogir by 40:24 in the 8th round of the Croatian Championship. Coach Zdravko Zovko gave chance to all his players. Penezic once again showed great form and scored nine goals, Franic scored seven.

The first opponent of Podravka in Group C will be the Russian champions and last season’s CL semi-finalists, Lada.

Lada on top

In last match of the domestic competition, the team of Alexey Gumyanov was not very convincing. In an away match in the 6th round of the Russian Championship Lada defeated GK-53 with only one goal, 29:28 (15:15).

Muravyeva scored nine and Bliznova scored eight goals. Postnova did not play.

Lada are now on top of the Russian Championship with 12 points from six matches.

Podravka Vegeta will meet Lada in Koprivnica on Friday at 16:15. The referees will be Peter Bol and Edward Willem Van Eck from Netherlands.

HTV 2 and NTV plus Sport will show the match live.

TEXT: Ivan Ambros