The win – 64:60 on aggregate – means Mikkel Hansen still has the chance to win his first-ever Machineseeker EHF Champions League trophy. His last match at club level will be on 9 June at the TruckScout24 EHF FINAL4, when Aalborg head coach Stefan Madsen will also finish his six-year stint with the pinnacle event of European club handball in Cologne.
Player of the Match Mads Hoxer (23 years old) and Thomas Arnoldsen (22) were the heroes in attack, netting nine and six times respectively in the exciting Match of the Week, while Niklas Landin made 14 saves (34.2 per cent). In contrast to the first leg, when they turned around a 15:21 deficit into a 32:31 win, Veszprém could not do it again. They missed out on their eighth participation at Cologne and have to wait one more year for their first trophy.
QUARTER-FINAL, LEG 2
MOTW: Aalborg Håndbold (DEN) vs Telekom Veszprém HC (HUN) 33:28 (18:14)
Aalborg win 64:60 on aggregate
- Veszprém were on fire in the first 10 minutes, pulling ahead to 7:4, before Aalborg found their rhythm, first striking back with a 4:0 run, then extending the lead to 18:14 at the break
- Mads Hoxer and Thomas Arnoldsen were the driving forces for the hosts, combining for 50 per cent of all goals in the first half; Niklas Landin clearly won the goalkeeper duel against Rodrigo Corrales and Mike Jensen
- the match got rougher after the break with a string of two-minute suspensions for both sides. Veszprém managed to reduce the gap as Corrales improved, Dragen Pechmalbec defended like a lion and most of their penalties ended in the net
- on the other side, Niklas Landin showed another extraordinary performance: three consecutive saves provided his side with a decisive 29:25 lead in the 51st minute
- with two minutes left and trailing 28:31, Veszprém striker Sergei Kosorotov had a goal disallowed; when Mikkel Hansen netted a penalty for a 32:28 lead, Aalborg’s ticket to Cologne was secured
Aalborg’s second chance at Cologne
Six Danish teams won the EHF Champions League Women between 2004 and 2009, but a men’s team from Denmark has never made it to the winners’ podium. The first semi-finalists were Kolding IF in 2002 and the first Danish participants at the EHF FINAL4 in Cologne were AG Copenhagen in 2012, finishing third.
In 2021, Aalborg Håndbold arrived as the underdogs in Cologne, then beat Paris Saint-Germain 35:33 in the semi-final to become the first-ever Danish finalists. But Barça hit them hard with the biggest ever final margin, 36:23.
In 2021/22, Aalborg failed in the quarter-finals against Veszprém and in 2022/23, they lost the all-Danish play-off against GOG. Now, they made their dream come true again.
Photos © René Schütze
