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Elverum Handball extend their unbeaten streak to three matches and took their second group phase victory in a row: After the surprising a 34:30 result at Pick Szeged last week, the Norwegian champions left PPD Zagreb chanceless with a 30:25 score line. Four Elverum players (Pettersen, Johansson, Heldal, Grøndahl) and Zagreb’s Cavar scored five goals each. For Zagreb, it was the 20th consecutive EHF Champions group match without a victory.
Group A:
Elverum Handball (NOR) vs HC PPD Zagreb (CRO) 30:25 (15:10)
- Zagreb remain without a victory, the 27:27 in the first leg against the Norwegian side remains their only point, while Elverum overtook Vardar in the table, having six points now like Szeged.
- Zagreb were never ahead in the first half, but were on an equal level until the 10:9 - then Elverum scored a 5:1 run for the half-time score of 15:10.
- Main key for Elverum’s clear gap at the break was goalkeeper Emil Kheri Imsgard, who stopped eleven shots in the first 30 minutes to be on a 52% saving rate, finally he was on 16 saves.
- Latest, when Hungarian Dominik Mathe netted for the 23:16 in the 41st minute, the winners were confirmed.
- Elverum were intermediately even close to their biggest ever EHF Champions League victory, the 37:26 against Celje in 2019.
Börge Lund focuses only on Elverum
For four years, Borge Lund had been the assistant coach of Christian Berge in the Norwegian men’s national team, now he quit his double function and focuses only on his club job at Elverum. He was part of the coaching staff when Norway won silver at the 2017 and 2019 World Championships and bronze at the EHF EURO 2020. Since 2020, the 2010 EHF Champions League winner (as a player of THW Kiel), is the head coach at Elverum. His successor in the national team is Jonas Wille, parallel coach at IFK Kristianstad in Sweden.
All photos are courtesy of Beate Oma Dahle
TEXT: EHF / Björn Pazen
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