Füchse win thriller in Lisbon to snatch seventh win, Aalborg save a point in Kielce
As the round 7 drew to a close on Thursday night, the Machineseeker EHF Champions League group phase is about to cross the halfway mark.
The sole early evening game saw a proper thriller between Kielce and Aalborg, with the Danish side saving a point at the last second, thanks to Niklas Landin and Buster Juul-Lassen. Füchse remain on top of group A, with the maximum of 14 points, as the German side managed to come back victorious from Lisbon. Nantes, in the last game of the evening, defeated Dinamo without stress.
In group B, Barça keep pressuring SC Magdeburg, as they took the points against Plock at home, relying on Emil Nielsen and Viktor Hallgrimsson’s saves, despite playing without their suspended head coach Carlos Ortega.
We can say a lot about that last action, but it is what it is. We can be satisfied with the draw, but also unsatisfied because we didn’t win. It was a good game in terms of both technique and tactics, against an extremely demanding opponent. Hopefully luck will come back to us in the spring. Today we took a step forward.
In that last action we were lucky… I don’t know if we really deserved that point. Kielce played very well — in my opinion, their best game of the season. But I’m also a bit angry with our defence. The opponents controlled the pace of the game, and whenever they sped up, they were better than us.
We’re very happy — we played a great game. We had targeted Lumbroso, and even though he managed to get through a few times, we limited his impact on the game. Nacho played well; it was a beautiful match. We have to make the most of these Champions League games at home.
Our start to the match was difficult. Against a team like Nantes, we were quickly punished. Next week, we'll need to work on both our attack and defense, limit Nantes' possession to put our goalkeepers in better positions, and come back more competitive.
It was a really tough game and I’m super happy with my players. Congratulations to Füchse, we need to still work and believe that we can win in the future. It was a big fight between Gidsel and Kiko and good to see it.
It was absolute great promotion for our sport. So much quality during the whole game. We are very proud to take the two points here in an amazing atmosphere. It was one of those days in which if a could buy a Kiko’s jersey from today I would do it. It was absolutely amazing. I’m very proud of the coolness we had on the end.
I’m very grateful to the players for what they did for me and for the team today. They were amazing, from the first player to the last one. I want to highlight specially those who didn’t play that much and even though were cheering in the bench. Today we showed the great team we are.
I’m very happy for meeting again the Barça fans, my former teammates and everyone here at the club. I spent four incredible years here and I’m very glad to be back at Palau. Tonight we showed a different attitude than the other day. We fought until the end even though we know we have a long path to reach this level. But we have to trust ourselves.
Thursday's action
