Courtesy: LEN
While in Group B
Barceloneta, Brescia and Ferencvaros practically secured their F8 berths after
six rounds, Group A doesn’t stop offering stunning results. After downing
Olympiacos two days ago, Marseille added Jug to its list of casualties by
beating the Croats in an epic 28-goal game. The Greeks almost suffered another
surprising defeat in Ostia but a goal 14 seconds from time saved at least a
point for them against Spandau.
Group A (Ostia) –
Round 7: CN Marseille (FRA) v Jug Adriatic Osiguranje Dubrovnik (CRO) 15-13,
Olympiacos Piraeus (GRE) v Spandau 04 Berlin (GER) 8-8, Pro Recco (ITA) v CC
Ortigia (ITA) 10-3
Standings: 1. Recco 21, 2. Jug 15, 3. Olympiacos 10, 4. Marseille 7, 5. Spandau
5, 6. Ortigia 3
Group B (Budapest) – Round 6: AN Brescia (ITA) v Dinamo Tbilisi (GEO) 14-6,
Zodiac Atletic Barceloneta (ESP) v Waspo 98 Hannover (GER) 12-8, FTC- Telekom
Budapest (HUN) v Jadran Herceg Novi (MNE) 12-5
Standings: 1. Barceloneta 15, 2. Brescia 15, 3. Ferencvaros 15, 4. Hannover 3,
5. Jadran 3, 6. Dinamo 3
Marseille began the
season with high hopes after contracting more greats to boost their line-up
which had been strong enough to win the Euro Cup in 2019. However, they left
Ostia empty-handed in December – they played tight matches with Recco (9-11)
and Jug (10-11) but lost both than suffered a surprising defeat from Ortigia.
Now they showed some character and strength – though they could claim a single
point against Spandau, then they caught Olympiacos, forced Recco to another
extremely tough battle and now they crowned this ‘middle phase’ with a
fantastic win over Jug. Beating the 2016 and 2018 champions in three days is
quite a feat – and the French just did that.
It was an epic
28-goal game, not a full appraisal of defences but pure entertainment for the
fans. Ugo Crousillat’s double was important towards the end of the first, the
second indeed just beat the buzzer, for 5-3 and Igor Kovacevic made it 6-3
early in the second which gave confidence for the French side. Soon they were
9-4 up – Jug’s goalie Toni Popadic was substituted after the 8th as he stood
1/9 – but the Croats put everything together and netted three in 101 seconds so
it looked much better by halftime at 9-7.
After a three-minute
fight in the third Jug got even closer with Hrvoje Benic’s blast and after a
killed man-down the Croats had a man-up to go even but hit the post – while
Ante Vukicevic, Marseille’s Croatian star, sent the ball home from the distance
for 10-8. That lifted his team’s spirit, also broke their goalless phase after
7:54 minutes, so they didn’t get too tense when Jug managed reply twice and
only a single goal separated the sides before the last interval (11-10).
One missed man-up at
both ends opened the fourth, then Vukicevic made a clean job in the next 6 on
5. Again missed extras came before Romain Vernoux converted another for
Marseille and in 32 seconds Vukicevic finished a counter to extend the gap to
four with 3:50 remaining. It looked like a mission impossible but Jug almost
made it: scored three from their next four possessions so it was 14-13 and 1:23
to go. Soon they got the ball but a turnover foul halted their efforts and Kovacevic’s
6m shot closed down the contest 19 seconds before the end.
Tensions didn’t cease
in the second game either. Though Olympiacos took a flying start, Spandau
levelled the score and only a late goal one second before the buzzer gave the
Greeks a 3-2 lead before the first break. Soon came the first big twist as the
Germans produced a brilliant second period, netted two in 72 seconds at the
beginning, kept the Greek offense at bay for the entire quarter while adding
one more later to lead 3-5 at halftime. Soon they were 3-6 up and Olympiacos
was in real trouble. They finally could break their silence after 11:10 minutes
and that was their wake-up call, toward the end they came up with a whirlwind,
three more goals in just 80 seconds, the last two from counters, and they
rushed ahead at 7-6. But the Germans managed to find a calming goal from a
man-up 11 seconds before the end of the third to level the score at 7-7.
The fourth turned
into a tremendous fight. Olympiacos earned a man-up but hit the post and soon
their centre-shot was also denied by Spandau’s goalie Laszlo Baksa. In the
middle of the period Lucas Gielen’s brilliant shot from the wing gave the lead
back to Spandau and the Greeks tried in vain to get the ball past Baksa. When
they missed their next (and last) man-up with 1:20 remaining and the second
shot was saved, it was ‘trouble-time’ again. The Germans couldn’t secure their
win and with 40 seconds from time Olympiacos had a last ball after a time-out.
And they just copied the action which had brought Spandau the goal earlier,
their US national team player Peter Daube let the ball fly from the left wing
14 seconds to go and that saved at least a point for the Greeks. Indeed, they
were celebrating and hugging each other at the bench after the buzzer – a loss
would reduce the gap to 3 points between them and the Germans, now it remained
5 before the last tournament in April.
The final match of
this March rendezvous was the local derby which turned into a one-sided contest
as Ortigia ran out of ideas, energy and perhaps desire. Recco didn’t give any
mercy for the fellow Italian team – though at first they seemed to offer some
by keeping Croatian world champ Marko Bijac on the bench but the reserve goalie
Tommaso Negri did an amazing job in Recco’s goal. He kept his house clean for
21:10 minutes, was 7/7 while his mates netted seven in front. Ortigia had a
brighter spell after 7-0 and came back to 8-3 by the end of the third, but
could not add more in the last eight minutes. After qualifying in November and
offering some promising performances December, they left Ostia with four
straight defeats this time – and have only slim hopes to achieve even bigger
things as a newcomer.
The schedule of Group
B didn’t promise hot clashes, rather three must-win matches for the favourites.
And they all passed their respective tests with ease – first in the morning in
the hotel where all staying inside the bubble had to undergo the usual
procedure, then in the pool in the afternoon. The results were negative in the
first part of the day and positive in the second.
Brescia was the first
to clear the hurdle and they didn’t have any problem while downing Dinamo. The
Georgians could improve in scoring somewhat after the opening day’s nightmare
when they netted three in the last 95 seconds against Hannover. They had 4
against Ferencvaros and 6 against Brescia – though the number of conceded goals
also grew: 10, 11, now 14. On the other end, the Italians claimed their third
straight win here, all were easy ones against the lower ranked sides which may
have served them as a warm- up for the big game on Friday against Ferencvaros.
Today Brescia was dominating, outshooting the Georgians 34-21 in total, the
number of shots on goal was 23-13 – the outcome was inevitable.
Barceloneta had a bit
more problems against Hannover as the Germans did not do the favour of cracking
down. At the beginning it looked like another fine afternoon for the Spaniards,
they jumped to a 3-0 lead early on and went 6-2 up in the second so all seemed
to be set. But it wasn’t as Hannover always climbed back whenever their rivals
opted to push the gas pedal a bit lighter. So even though Barceloneta rushed
ahead again to lead 8-4, the Germans used their chances and trailed only 9-7
before the final period. They had a couple of possessions to further reduce the
distance in the fourth but could not really penetrate the Spanish defence in
the first two minutes. Then the favourites slowly but safely regained full
control and sailed away with three points by adding three goals and conceding
only one, 6 seconds before the end. Still, from Hannover’s angle this 8-12
looked way better than the 8-16 in December.
Ferencvaros began its
match versus Jadran similarly as on the previous days, playing with patience
and discipline. By putting away the extras plus delivering a couple of action
goals they jumped to a 4-1 lead after eight minutes. But unlike a day earlier
when they had carried on scoring and decided the encounter against Dinamo by
halftime, they started missing their man-ups and Peter Tesanovic added more
great saves in the second period. The Montenegrin youngsters smelled blood and
soon it stood 4-3 and they even had a possession to go even. Then, after a
drought of 7:12 minutes, Vendel Vigvari netted one from the distance and in the
dying seconds he managed to put away a man-up too, though it was only confirmed
during the break after a video-review. Vigvari, a 19 year-old struggling here
in the first two days, was on fire, hit his 4th early in the third and when Nikola
Jaksic bagged one more for the title-holder, the game was virtually over at
8-3. Jadran could halt its bad run after 9:05 minutes but the home side took
care of keeping the ‘safe distance’ while they also tried to save the key
players’ energy for the last day’s crucial clash with Brescia.
Fixtures for Friday
Group B, Round 7: 14.00 Dinamo v Barceloneta, 16.30: Brescia v FTC, 19.00
Hannover v Jadran
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streaming from each game – for detailed match stats and live-scoring
visit http://len.microplustiming.com/lenchampionsleague/index.php?cal=1
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