One day to throw-off; interview sessions underway
The day before throw-off at the TruckScout24 EHF FINAL4 2026 — on Friday, the Machineseeker EHF Champions League 2025/26 semi-finalists undergo their last preparations, participate in interviews and attend the opening party with fans at LANXESS arena. This live blog guides you through everything taking place in Cologne.
We had a great season. We only lost one game, against Magdeburg, so it feels kind of logical to be here. But we worked a lot. There were a lot of changes last summer and we needed to build some more combinations among us to make things work.
We have won the title twice already. We know how amazing it is, and most of the players in the team were present already. We don’t need any more motivation than to remember how it was back then. We are just 100 per cent motivated.
12:32
The media calls are beginning, with an official opening from EHF President Michael Wiederer and then SC Magdeburg first up for interviews. In attendance alongside coach Bennet Wiegert are Magnus Saugstrup, Felix Claar, Lukas Mertens, Sergey Hernandez and two-time EHF FINAL4 MVP Gísli Kristjánsson.
Kristjánsson is only the second player to have been named MVP of the event twice. The other was also an Icelandic centre back: Aron Palmarsson, playing for THW Kiel in 2014 then Veszprém in 2016.
12:26
To a look at the defending title holders, SC Magdeburg. This weekend, Magdeburg aim to take their fourth Champions League trophy, following the two in recent years — 2025 and 2023 — and the first in 2002.
In a special story featuring the coach that led SCM to that first trophy, current Germany national coach Alfred Gislason, journalist Björn Pazen looks back on the early years of the Champions League, when Magdeburg ended a period of absolute dominance from Spanish clubs.
In that Magdeburg squad that raised the trophy in 2002 was the side's curent coach, Bennet Wiegert.
"Back then, I couldn’t realise that Benno would become such a successful coach. But his character was already exceptional," says Gislason of Wiegert.
Check out the feature with Gislason below!
10:56
Over to Aalborg now, where I spoke to Sander Sagosen about their “Road to Cologne,” his hopes for this TruckScout24 EHF FINAL4, and above all, his deep connection to the club. Sagosen moved to Aalborg early in his career, aged 18, and it is there that he developed into the megastar he would become.
“You reach for your dreams, and you work towards your goals, and you achieve and you achieve and it's the first time,” said Sagosen.
“Despite that it’s every time special winning a title, the first time is always the most special one,” he added, referring to the Danish league title won in 2017 — a feat Aalborg have just replicated, making it a three-peat in Denmark.
Sagosen says that how far Aalborg has come is a testament to the way they work — something that struck him from the beginning, back in 2014, before he departed in 2017 then returned in 2025.
“For me coming here, I was 18 years old. Quite young. An inexperienced player. They took really good care of me. It was like coming to a family, with the club, with the team, with the players, and also the fans — everything, the whole thing around this club is so special for me.
“It's quite unique and I think how far this club also has come shows how they work, not only on the handball pitch, but that it’s a family who's working on it.”
Aalborg have yet to win the EHF Champions League, and Sagosen hopes the team can deliver on that biggest dream this weekend — an achievement that would be extremely special for the Norwegian who has taken the title once before, with Kiel in 2020. Read the whole story below!
