Familiar rivalries headline EHF Champions League Women round 6
Round 6 of the EHF Champions League Women 2024/25 sees a rematch of the 2023/24 quarter-final clash between CSM Bucuresti and Metz Handball – two teams on a four-game winning streak.
We were sad after we lost in Metz and we left one point in Debrecen, but we don't have a lot of time until the next tough game, so we need to stand up quickly. Of course, we know that we need improve, but I am sure we can, and I know as well that our fans will push us again until the last whistle in our next match.
FTC are an offensively excellent team, and although we know them well from the past, they may be the most challenging team to prepare for. But I think we have the answer for them. In my opinion, we are the strongest team defensively in our group and we will prove it. But we will also have to be at a high level in attack and show stability.
We have to be prepared for the fact that we will certainly have a difficult match, but I think that it is still up to us to play at home. First of all, we have to fight the most in defense and show desire and character. I believe that this will bring us a positive result.
It is undoubtedly an incredibly important match for us. Like us, Podravka has played some good and close matches, so we expect an exciting match. A win will also be important to preserve our chances further in the tournament, while getting the first points could be a redemption.
They have quite the same team as when we met them in the final in May, but they have brought in some new players and they have kept those who were there last year. The most important focus for us is ourselves. We want to play our handball our way, and we must be aware of that there will be some counterplay and we must be ready to solve that.
We need teamwork and everyone who play on the court needs to give 100 per cent fight and enjoy the game. I think this is the key and most important for us. I’m looking forward on Sunday.
We are expecting a very hard game, Metz has a lot of good players but we are prepared for this. I believe we need to be able to fight against their speed on the fast breaks. We had a hard week with the game in Ljubljana last weekend, then the national league game against Rapid and now we are facing Metz, another very good team
It's going to be a very important match, we have to expect a lot of intensity for 60 minutes. We are motivated and determined to get the three points, we want to go back up the slope and seek all the points we can. We will not give up and fight until the end.
We want to finish this second block of five matches well. We had a perfect first block, the second is almost perfect for now with only one defeat against Györ. For now we're doing well, it's important to bring home the victory from this trip. We hope to be mentally and physically well for Saturday and continue our momentum.
We learned lessons from the defeat against Ludwigsburg and tried to correct the mistakes in training. Vipers are weakened compared to last season, but are still high quality. Nevertheless, we will do our best to get the first victory in the Champions League.
Odense can play a really fast game, so we need to be aware of their contra. But they also have a lot of good one against one players in the team, so it’s important that our defence is really compact so we can run from there. I’m really excited to play against Odense.
Ludwigsburg are a team with a lot of quality, with a Scandinavian-inspired way of playing. They have players who can shoot from nine metres, smart centre backs, and strong goal keepers. I think it will be important to stand strong in our defence and use our counter attacks.
