Goal records for Berlin and Szeged, victorious debut for Melsungen
The second part of round 1 in the EHF Champions League Men 2026/27 saw three clear wins and two close encounters: Füchse Berlin netted 44 goals at Belgrade, also OTP Bank - PICK Szeged against IFK Kristianstad and Sporting against GOG crossed the 40-goals mark. Montpellier (at Bucharest) and Champions League debutants MT Melsungen against former winners HC Vardar had tougher challenges to take their first points.
Congratulations to Berlin, the players, the coach. They play amazing. The last season and this season they started to play very good handball. It was very difficult for us. In the first half we lost a lot of balls in attack and then it's a fast team with very good players, with quality. It was impossible for us, and the second half was for nothing. We have to improve a lot to fight more, and we will do it.
First of all, I would say thanks for this warm welcome for me and my whole family. Since yesterday we were feeling like at home. It was a privilege to play in front of these fans. We knew that Partizan are a new team, so we were prepared for them, and I think we played very concentrated from the beginning. Maybe our experience in those matches made the difference today, and I would like just to say to the whole team of Partizan that they should keep their heads up. There are games that are coming, so I wish them all the best, and I hope we see you soon.
That was a strong performance by my team against a very tough opponent. That’s the Champions League. All the teams are very good, and it’s not easy to win. But that was just the first game, and we’ll need many more performances like that if we’re going to advance to the next round.
It was a good match from both teams. There were a few moments where we could have tied the game or maybe get the lead. The atmosphere was great and that led to the deserved win for Melsungen.
I'm mostly happy with what I saw on the court tonight. We are back in the Champions League, and our supporters created an amazing atmosphere in the arena. We are in a difficult situation, with several injuries, but I am still very pleased with the performance of our young players. We also had the opportunity to give some of our academy players valuable minutes, and they performed really well. Szeged have a bright future.
Congratulations to Szeged. They played a really good game. For us, it has been a fantastic experience to compete at this level. As for the match, we didn't start well, and our opponent was simply better than us tonight. Still, it was a good game.
It was, in fact, a magnificent game from us. Especially the first half was fantastic on defensive terms. We were very competent and our strategy worked. Today, we were far superior to a very good team and it’s not easy to do what we did tonight. We missed this EHF Champions League nights.
It's fair to say that they were far better than us today. We were sloppy and allowed too many situations that we wanted to stop before the match. In the second half we found ourselves a little bit better, playing with high speed as we like. It was ok, but we are disappointed.
Good first half, but especially in defence. In attack we found some solutions to score, but finally we didn't realize what we found. In the first half we had nine goals in 20 shots. With 45 per cent efficiency is impossible to do something... Against these kind of teams, theoretically this is defeat for us, but also in the practice it was defeat because it's not possible to miss too many shots like we missed.
I'm really happy to have won here for our return to the Champions League, we know that this group is very tough, very balanced. It was important for us to start with an away win. I'm proud of the battle we fought throughout the match.
