Foreshadow: Veszprém – Löwen

 

Telekom Veszprém hosts Rhein-Neckar Löwen on Saturday at 5:30 p.m. in the VELUX EHF Champions League. The game will be broadcasted live by Sport 1.

 

 

We have met Löwen in European Cup series quite a long time ago, as we have to go back to the 2014/15 season when both teams participated in the same group in the CL. First, we hosted Löwen and won 27:24. Our top scorer was Momir Ilic with nine goals. In the second game, we got into a bigger defeat in Mannheim, as the 32:25 final result was not in our favor. On this game Ilic and Nagy scored five goals each.

 

Looking at our overall history against the Germans we are still in positive balance. There are two Löwen victories next to four Veszprém win and two draws. The most memorable victory was definitely the first encounter between the teams in 2008 when we faced them in the two-game final of the Cup Winner’s Cup. First, we host them in Veszprém and won by five goals (37:32), while in away we clinched a very important draw (28:28) to secure our second Cup Winner’s Cup triumph in the Club’s history.

 

 

Löwen could not defend its title in the Bundesliga as they have come up short by one point against the new champions Flensburg. They played 34 games out which they won 27 times while losing 6 times and finished one game in a draw. Their top scorer in the domestic championship was Andy Schmid with 189 goals.

This year they are on fourth position with eight victories and one each of loss and draw collecting 17 points. They played against Bergischer HC on Thursday and won 25:30. Their top scorer so far this season is Jannik Kohlbacher with 56 goals.

 

The “Lions” were knocked out last year in the best 16 where they travelled to Kielce with their second team all thanks to their affair with the EHF. Their first team played a Bundesliga game on the same day as the Champions League game was held against Kielce. The Polish champions were not embarrassed by the chance and basically decided the matchup at home with a 41:17 victory. They managed to win in Germany by 6 goals as well, which meant that they literally knocked out the at that time German champions.

They have a pretty good run this year as they have managed to win three games out of five. Only Kielce and Vardar could beat them, while they triumphed over Barcelona, Brest and Kristianstad. They are currently on the third spot in the group. Their top scorer is Andy Schmid with 29 goals.

 

 

 

Löwen filled up the void left by seven departing player with five new players. Jannik Kohlbacher came from Wetzlar, Steffen Fäth came from Füchse Berlin, Ilija Abutovic signed from Vardar, Vladan Lipovina left TV Hüttenberg while Jesper Nielsen came from PSG. The departing players are Harald Reinkind and Hendrik Pekeler to THW Kiel, Kim Ekdahl Du Rietz to PSG, Rafael Baena to Bergischer HC, Klaus Gartner is now a coach at HC Alpla Hard in Austria, Kristian Bliznac has retired while Momir Rnic is still looking for a club.

 

The ”Építők” played in the Hungarian league last time, when they hosted the arch rival MOL-Pick Szeged. The game did not end well for Veszprém as they suffered another loss against the “Blues”. Their last Champions League game was against the title holder Montpellier in France and Telekom Veszprém managed to win in a huge fight 29:30. This was the first game of David Davis as head coach.

 

The next big challenge is Löwen which will prove to be a difficult one, but the boys are preparing for the clash accordingly. The Arena will be full again and we hope that the cheer of the Fans and the work done this week will bring its results on Saturday.

 

Let’s go Veszprém!

 

 

 

 

Photo: Dávid Vörös