Göppingen unbeaten for 23 games; new low and high score records

Only four matches remain in the Men’s EHF Cup, to decide the winner and the successor of defending champions Frisch Auf Göppingen.

Familiar faces will meet at the Ottostadt Magdeburg EHF Cup Finals in Magdeburg on May 19 and 20, as it is exactly the same four clubs in the pot for the semi-final draw on Wednesday (11:00 hrs local time, live streamed on ehfTV.com) as those that fought for the trophy on the final weekend in 2017.

Besides the defending champions and hosts Magdeburg, last year’s finalists Füchse Berlin and Saint-Raphael Var Handball – the only non-German team – made it to the final tournament.

Here are all major facts, figures and numbers of the competition.

0 French teams have won the Men’s EHF Cup – neither in the new nor the old format, nor the Cup Winners’ Cup.

0 zero times since the implementation of the new format in the 2012/13 season have the EHF Cup champions been coached by a German, but a German team won four times. This year the chance is there, as all three German participants are coached by Germans (Berlin coach Velimir Petkovic has a German passport now, though he was born in Banja Luka).

0 national champions that entered the EHF Cup from the VELUX EHF Champions League Qualification made it to the quarter-finals.

0 teams that started in the second qualification round made it to the final weekend in Magdeburg.

1 EHF Cup champion managed to defend their title in the new format: current champions Frisch Auf Göppingen, who took the trophy in 2016 in Nantes and reclaimed it on home ground last year.

1 non-German team has won the new-format EHF Cup: Pick Szeged in 2014, playing against Montpellier in the final in Berlin.

1 team – Göppingen (nine victories, one draw so far in the 2017/18 season) – travel to the Ottostadt Magdeburg EHF Cup Finals unbeaten.

1 former EHF Champions League winner – as in every year so far – is still in the race for the EHF Cup trophy: SC Magdeburg. The same team were quarter-finalists in 2013 and 2016, and semi-finalist in 2017. Other former Champions League winners that fought for the EHF Cup trophy were Montpellier (2014) and Hamburg (2015). So far, no former Champions League winner has won the trophy.

1 nation – Denmark – is represented in all four squads at the Ottostadt Magdeburg EHF Cup Finals.

1 coach present at the Ottostadt Magdeburg EHF Cup Finals has won the EHF Cup as a player – with the club he coaches now: Bennet Wiegert (Magdeburg in 2007).

1 team arriving from the quarter-finals won both knock-out matches: defending champions Frisch Auf Göppingen, against Chambery Savoie.

1 coach of among the Ottostadt Magdeburg EHF Cup Finals participants has won the EHF Cup as a coach – Füchse’s Velimir Petkovic, twice with Frisch Auf Göppingen (2011, 2012).

1 team that finished second on their group phase table made it to Magdeburg: Saint-Raphael.

2 times – and for the second time in a row – three German sides are among the four participants.

2 winners of the new version of the EHF Cup are among the four Ottostadt Magdeburg EHF Cup Finals participants: Füchse Berlin (2015) and Frisch Auf Göppingen (2016, 2017).

2 all-German finals have been played since the competition merged: Berlin vs Hamburg in 2015 and Göppingen vs Berlin in 2017.

2 hosts of EHF Cup Finals have taken the trophy: Berlin in 2015 and Göppingen in 2017. Füchse failed in the 2014 semi-finals on home ground, while Nantes lost the final on their own court twice, to Löwen (2013) and Göppingen (2016).

3 – which means all – German teams that qualified for the finals have won the EHF Cup at least once: Magdeburg (1999, 2001, 2007), Göppingen (2011, 2012, 2016, 2017) and Berlin (2015).

3 nations are represented among the previous EHF Cup-winning coaches: Iceland (Gudmundur Gudmundsson/2013 and Dagur Sigurdsson/2015), Spain (Juan Carlos Pastor/2014) and Sweden (Magnus Andersson/2016 and 2017). In 2018, a fourth nationality will be added – either Germany or France.

3 EHF Cup Finals participants finished on top of their groups: Magdeburg (Group A), Berlin (Group B) and Göppingen (Group C).

3 matches since the start of the group phase ended with 45 or less goals: in Group C, Cocks vs Nexe (20:22) and Koper vs Göppingen (20:25), then the quarter-final Füchse vs Nexe 25:16.

4 teams, which means all, that were part of the 2017 edition of the EHF Cup Finals made it again.

4 times, including 2018, Göppingen and Berlin have been part of the EHF Cup Finals.

4 times, Göppingen have won the EHF Cup – twice each in the old format (2011, 2012) and the new format (2016, 2017) making them the record title holders ahead of SC Magdeburg (1999, 2001, 2007) and THW Kiel (1998, 2002, 2004) with three trophies each.

6 – which means all – times the EHF Cup Finals hosts qualified directly from the group phase, skipping the quarter-finals (Nantes and Berlin twice each, Göppingen and now Magdeburg).

6 matches since the start of the group phase ended with a margin of 10 or more goals – two of them in the quarter-finals, both of which came in the encounters between Saint-Raphael and Granollers (37:23, 30:40).

7 nations have been represented by the clubs that played the EHF Cup Finals since 2013: Germany (12 teams), France (six), Denmark (three), Spain (one), Hungary (one), Romania (one) and Slovenia (one).

7 goals was the highest aggregate margin in the quarter-finals (Göppingen vs Chambery/61:54).

8 goals were the advantage for RK Nexe against Füchse Berlin after the first-leg quarter-final (28:20), but Berlin won the rematch 25:16.

8 matches since the start of the group phase were attended by more than 3,000 fans, including the quarter-final Berlin vs Nexe (5,000).

9 matches since the start of the qualification ended with a draw: five in qualification Round 1, none in Round 2, two in Round 3 and two in the group phase. No quarter-final ended with a levelled result.

10 goals were the advantage for Granollers in the second-leg quarter-final against Saint-Raphael (40:30), but the Catalan team were still eliminated after losing the first leg 23:37.

12 points from six group matches – the maximum – were taken by Göppingen. The defending champions also achieved this in the previous season.

14 goals in the quarter-final Saint-Raphael vs Granollers (37:23) was the highest margin since the start of the group phase. Before, the 2017/18 record was 12 goals, in the match Magdeburg vs Presov (36:24).

17 matches since the start of the group phase ended with 60 or more goals scored, including two quarter-finals. In the previous season, it was nearly the same number at this stage: 16.

18 times, a German team has won the old (14) and the new (4) version of the EHF Cup since the implementation of the competition in the 1993/94 season. Five times the winner came from Spain, while Croatia and Hungary each count one EHF Cup winner.

18 nations are represented by the players on court in the Ottostadt Magdeburg EHF Cup Finals: GER, FRA, CIV, CZE, BLR, SRB, DEN, ROU, ESP, SWE, CRO, SLO, SVK, ISL, POL, RUS, NOR, AUT. Last year, it was 15 different nations.

21 away wins (20 in the group phase, one in the quarter-finals) were among the 54 results since the start of the group phase – exactly the same number as in the 2016/17 season.

23 EHF Cup matches in a row (including the last two seasons) is Göppingen’s unbeaten record in this competition. The last team to beat Göppingen in the EHF Cup was Magdeburg, in the first leg of the 2015/16 quarter-finals (29:27).

31 times (26 in the group matches, five times in the quarter-finals), the home team was victorious since the start of the group phase. In the previous season, there were 32 home victories at the same stage of the competition.  

41 goals in the quarter-final Füchse vs Nexe (25:16) was the lowest score in a match since the start of the group phase.

70 goals in the quarter-final rematch Granollers vs Saint-Raphael (40:30) makes it the highest scoring game since the start of the group phase.

75 goals were scored by Uladzislau Kulesh (Minsk) and Nico Rönnberg (Cocks) to lead the top scorer list so far. The top scorer still in competition is the 2016/17 top scorer Hans Lindberg (Berlin), with 67 goals.

331 goals were scored by Saint-Raphael to have the most effective attack of all four participants.

334 goals were scored in the six quarter-final matches.

2,943 goals were scored since the start of the group phase, which means an average of 54.5 per match. Last season, it was 3,029 goals at the same time.

5,983 fans is the record attendance since the start of the 2017/18 group phase, when Berlin hosted Anaitasuna. The largest number of fans attending a quarter-final match was 5,000, again in Berlin, against Nexe.

Top three of the group phase and quarter-finals:
High-scoring matches:
70 goals: Granollers vs Saint-Raphael (40:30, QF)
67 goals: Azoty-Pulawy vs Granollers (30:37, GP)
67 goals: Anaitasuna vs Saint-Raphael (29:38, GP)

Low-scoring matches:
41 goals: Berlin vs Nexe (25:16, QF)
42 goals: Cocks vs Nexe (20:22, GP)
45 goals: Koper vs Göppingen (20:25, GP)

Biggest margins:
+14 goals: Saint-Raphael vs Granollers (37:23, QF)
+12 goals: Magdeburg vs Presov (36:24, GP)
+11 goals: Cocks vs Göppingen (20:31, GP)
+11 goals: Füchse vs Anaitasuna (34:23, GP)

Spectators:
5,983: Berlin vs Anaitasuna (GP)
5,805: Berlin vs Lund (GP)
5,000: Berlin vs Nexe (QF)

Top scorers:
75 goals: Uladzislau Kulesh (Minsk)
75 goals: Nico Rönnberg (Cocks)
68 goals: Lenny Rubin (Thun)

Top scorers still in competition:
67 goals: Hans Lindberg (Berlin)
62 goals: Raphael Caucheteux (Saint-Raphael)
57 goals: Marcel Schiller (Göppingen)

Season records of the four Ottostadt Magdeburg EHF Cup participants:
SC Magdeburg:
8 matches – 6 victories – 0 draws – 2 defeats – 12 points
245:209 goals, goal difference: +36

Frisch Auf Göppingen:
10 matches – 9 victories – 1 draw – 1 defeats – 19 points
296:246 goals, goal difference: +50

Füchse Berlin:
10 matches – 8 victories – 0 draws – 2 defeats – 16 points
293:250 goals, goal difference: +43

Saint-Raphael Var Handball:
10 matches – 8 victories – 0 draws – 2 defeats – 16 points
331:288 goals, goal difference: +43