Rampant Szeged take four-goal advantage over Kiel

MOL-Pick Szeged raked up a four goal lead against THW Kiel, whose poor defence allowed in 33 goals, this season’s third highest number of conceeded goals. The difference between the goalkeepers proved to be a more important factor than 7-meter shots.

MOL-Pick Szeged (HUN) vs THW Kiel (GER) 33-29 (16-14)

Group B’s fifth, Pick Szeged took on Kiel, who finished fourth in Group A in a re-match of last year’s quarter-final, when the German powerhouse ousted the Hungarian team.

Revenge-seeking Szeged took a flying start in the tremendous crescendo of noise turned up by the jam-packed Újszegedi arena and took an early lead. Jose Manuel Sierra was on fire and so was Gabor Ancsin meaning it took Kiel 10-12 minutes to catch the rhythm.

Despite Sierra kept winning his duels with Marko Vujin the visitors remained up front as Ilija Brozovic owned the Szeged wall and Joan Canellas was on target. The home side managed to equalize a couple of times before finally taking over Kiel, who struggled against the open Szeged wall while their defence stumbled against the quick attacks of the home side.

Szeged grew in confidence and were clearly in control of proceedings, Kiel felt lucky they were only trailing Pick by two goals at half-time.

However, Vladimir Vranjes and Zsolt Balogh’s goals were only enough to delay Kiel’s comeback, whose defence suddenly started to work and Szeged kept missing their 7 meter shots. Marko Vujin finally found the way past Sierra and Pastor had to take his time-out when Kiel got back to the driver’s seat by taking a two-goal lead.

Juan Paster, head coach of MOL-Pick Szeged said after the game: "We were able to come back in the game two times from being in a disadvantage and more importantly we were able to do that in the second half as well. This was only the first let, we experience last spring what is awaiting us in Kiel, so we must play even better away.

The roller-coaster ride continued as Szeged once again gathered momentum but that didn’t last long either, as the last ten minutes started with Kiel up front yet again. The teams kept exchanging the lead and the extremely close match promised a thrilling run-in but the home side owned the last eight minutes.

Kiel player, Marko Vujin said: "I am of course very dissappointed. Nothing is lost, we have to prepare for the second leg and in modern handball, a four goal lead is not the end."

Szeged kept their nerves, Sierra made some crucial saves and the home side eventualy emerged as winners having won the last 8 minutes 7-1. Last year the two-goal advantage proved way too short for the Hungarian outfit, in three days we will see if four goals can make a difference for Szeged.