Flensburg take revenge, while Plock easily win

Round 6 of the VELUX EHF Champions League Group Phase continued on Thursday with three home victories. Flensburg defeated defending champions Hamburg in a real thriller, while Zaporozhye and Plock had no problems in taking their second victories in the double-header.

Group A:
St. Petersburg HC (RUS) vs Motor Zaporozhye (UKR) 18:24 (10:14)
- first leg: 24:29

By taking the second victory against the Russian runners-up, Zaporozhye have confirmed the third place in their group by seven points now and cannot be overtaken by Zagreb and Celje anymore in this round. Like in the first leg Motor were the better team, but could not cast-off their opponent easily. St. Petersburg again fought brave, proved by a close four goal margin at the break.

When the host reduced to 12:14 in minute 34, the first point of this season seemed to be in reach, but then Motor had their best period, extending the gap pre-decisively to 20:13 within only five minutes. The last 15 minutes were quite equal, but the Ukrainian victory had never been endangered. Best scorer was Motor’s Oleg Skopintsev by five goals.

Group B:
Orlen Wisla Plock (POL) vs FC Porto (POR) 28:22 (12:10)
-  first leg 24:20

Wisla Plock opened the gate to the Last16 by beating Porto for the second time. Having a four point advance ahead of the Portuguese Wisla Plock are close to book their tickets. Aside now THW Kiel can only mathematical miss the k.o. round anymore, being eight points ahead of fifth ranked tem of Porto.

Eights goals of Marcin Lijewski and seven strikes of Petar Nenadic paved the way for an easy-going win for the Polish runners-ups. Porto stood strong in the first half, being below only by two goals, but the Portuguese lacked power, concentration and skills after the intermediate score of 18:16 for the host.

Group D:
SG Flensburg-Handewitt (GER) vs HSV Hamburg (GER) 27:24 (11:13)
- first leg 27:32

Group D is completely open again, after Flensburg took lucky revenge for the 27:32 defeat at Hamburg on Saturday. For most of the time the defending champions were the clearly better team, but finally a great catch-up chase decided the match for the hosts.

Flensburg have nine points on their account and are one point below HSV, which missed an early qualification for the Last 16 on Thursday after their first defeat following five consecutive wins before.

The first 20 minutes were equal with light advantages for Hamburg – but after the 30 minute the advance of HSV were only two goals after Flensburg had missed some big chances. Then it was former Flensburg shooter Petar Djordjic, who was responsible for a clear Hamburg lead in the middle of the second half – when most of the Flensburg fans had already resigned, as the guest team forged ahead to 21:16 in minute 45.

Flensburg did not resign, while now Hamburg missed some top shots, the margin was reduced to 21:23 – and from that moment on, the host had full control of the match. When last season’s Champions League top scorer Hans Lindberg was sent off the court by a red card after a foul against his Danish country fellow Anders Eggert, the match became emotional.

Flensburg equalized at 23:23, added two more goals on their tally to 25:23 – and with four minutes to go, suddenly SG were in a clear lead and took the victory.
Best scorers were Eggert with nine goals for Flensburg and Djordjic with eight strikes for HSV.