Laslo’s game: “My team expect me to adapt to the game and make the best decisions”

For Laslo, the role of centre back is about so much more than those key areas of goals and assists. It is about influencing the game in every way — paying attention to the strengths and weaknesses of both the individuals and the combinations in the particular line-up she has on court with her in a given moment, ensuring everyone is on the same page with what they are doing, and maintaining calm and encouraging confidence in her teammates.

“My role in this team, especially in this team, is to provide confidence and calm. Because, right now, teams are really crazy about speed and power at the same time,” says Laslo. “My team expect from me really smart choices about our playing in attack and they expect me to adapt to the game and to make the best decisions.”

Laslo’s career has unfolded mainly in her native Romania, where she gained her first European cup experience with Alexandrion Cluj, spent a season with Corona Brasov, had two years at CS Minaur Baia Mare and is now in her second with CS Gloria. Her one venture abroad was at Buducnost from 2017 to 2019, when Laslo was in her early 20s — 21 when she moved to Montenegro.

Laslo enjoys looking back at how her development has unfolded and continues to do so — step by step, gradually building, as both a player and a person. With each coach, club and iteration of the national team, she has grown.

“It was like, level up, level up, level up. Little by little, coaches, teammates, everything. The environment, people around the club, everything, marketing, how you handle everything. I think I developed in my life in not a fast way — a really, really nice way and calm, as I like to be and as I like things to happen to my life. So, you know, at 28, I can really say that I am where I am and it's really, really the way I wanted,” says Laslo.

Laslo says working with coaches like Ambros Martin, Dragan Adzic and Bojana Popovic through her career has been influential. A six-time winner of the EHF Champions League as a player, Popovic is renowned as one of the greats of the game. For a young Laslo early in her career, there was much to learn from the legendary Montenegrin back in terms of on-court perspective, how to approach each game and how to train.

“I was so, so impressed about her when I arrived there, in such a good way,” says Laslo, adding that Popovic was always very encouraging in training and fully lived every game, bringing a lot of energy to the team, despite being on the sideline as assistant coach with a focus on attack.

“In the difficult trainings, all the time, she told me, ‘Shoot more. Shoot. Train this more. Do this.’ And her…not secrets, because there is no secret nowadays in handball…just the way how she did things and how it works for her. So, she just shared with me a lot of details on what she believed and what she really, really trusted.

“And I like how she adapts to the game. For example, if we could prepare something for one game and it was not working in attack, she’d immediately find the new solution and the new way of ending up in attack.”

Back in the EHF Champions League this season, Laslo missed the first games due to injury, but returned to her role of orchestrating CS Gloria’s attack. So, what is Laslo thinking about when she leads her team into attack?

“First of all, I have to know all the time with which players from my team I am playing that moment and I have to know exactly what they can and they cannot do. So, for me to choose one action, it's first of all about my players and my team in that moment. Second, it's in my mind who is in front of us in defence and I try to find weak points. I try to see and to take the best option in the fastest way, because really now, these days, handball has become crazy fast.”

Speaking of knowing the strengths of the players she has on court with her, Laslo has the unique experience of playing alongside one of the best in history: Cristina Neagu. Neagu is the all-time top scorer of both the EHF EURO and the EHF Champions League Women, as well as the record winner of the IHF World Player of the Year award. As left back, she would play directly beside Laslo in the Romania team.

“With her, it's something else. It's really different. It's her and nobody else. If you ask me about her, I would just speak about her and not about backs or the other players, because the way how she sees and understands handball is really, really crazy. It's really, really comfortable, as a middle back, to have somebody like her on the left side — to know that she can shoot, she can pass, she can cross, she can do whatever without even speaking. And of course you have to reach this relation, but she can do this so easy, it doesn’t matter who is in the middle or her left and right side,” says Laslo.

“For me as a middle back, it was much easier with her. She could put me in the situation that I just shoot alone completely because she did all the job before. So, she can put a player in a really, really good situation. She can choose — all the time, she has two or three options to finish her actions.”

A standard attack is one thing, but in the final stages when it is time to seal the win, equalise or try to turn the momentum quickly, the stakes are higher. For some players, that means thinking about or doing something differently. For Laslo, it is the opposite, and she prefers to have no plan.

“I kind of don't really think about it, because I like to have this flow,” says Laslo, adding that stress or focusing on a particular plan can be a problem in this kind of situation. “For example, you go for a shot, but then they a put four-hand block, so what — you will still shoot? I really don't like to think that things will end up in one way or another way. I like more to play with freedom and more with attacking the space.”

Laslo says that at the top level, what decides a game — especially a tense, close one — is essentially who will make the first mistake.

“If you're in the situation that you have to decide, I will decide, for sure, one action which I think works a lot in that game, of course, with the players that I have on the court. But if I see one mistake in the defence in front of me, I will go for it. So, I don't like to put pressure on time or score.”

Laslo’s identifies her core strength in attack as her leadership, but she also plays a role in defence, and finds that defence can significantly contribute to a team’s offence.

“We start from defence. If you have a really good defence and goalkeeper next to you, to save some balls, you can really have a lot of success. Defence provides for attack and for the second phase a lot of stuff. After the goalkeeper saves a ball or you take one really good ball with your defence, with your system, and everybody knows it, it’s really, really good to go in the attack with full trust and the opponent team is really, really down because they lost the ball,” says Laslo.

“It’s about details and about making the opponent have a mistake first and to change the minds for the action. So, I think you can provide a lot of stress, and this is the way you can put them in the situation to give you the ball.”

Back to the attacking end of the court, Laslo says she does not have one specific move she favours or a particular action she enjoys performing the most. For her, it is all about the cohesion in the team and how she can help accomplish that — and that includes what she does off the court as well, because “the playmaker can be a really good leader in the locker room.

“My obsession is that, in the team, everybody has to know why and how we do things. I don't have a particular thing. I like to be, first of all, fair play with the opponent and with my team. And second of all, I want to be one step in front. When my I see my team is really good and reacts good and we do what we all prepared and everybody understands why and how we do things, for me, that’s the maximum of level of my satisfaction.”

Creativity is an important part of attack — to consistently surprise your opponents, even after they have studied the individual players and the team as a whole. To be able to shock those who know you well when playing against club teammates in a national team event and vice versa. For Laslo, the most important element to bring creativity on the court is her mind.

“In the mental way, you need to be really, really relaxed and really, really own your own mind, you know. You need to be less stressed, more calm, and like that everything is clear. And I really think mental health is an important factor in this idea. And it’s proved, to me it’s proved — if I'm not relaxed and I’m stressed about things, if I start to stress about the result or pressure in the team, for me it's not working. I think this is the key — mental health and if you're relaxed and calm, I think the creativity will start to come. And if you feel this flow, what I'm speaking about, it's coming,” concludes Laslo.

November 2024

Photos: kolektiff images