Hard fought win for Vardar in Nasice

Teška pobjeda Vardara, bez novog iznenađenja u Našicama

Nexe - Vardar

Vardar have, although much harder than expected, managed to reach a new SEHA victory beating NEXE with 30:27 only a day after losing to PPD Zagreb in Champions League.

Guys from Nasice were fearless from very beginning. They were four goals up after 13 minutes but after that, they have managed to score only three before the half-time whistle. They didn't have a proper attacking solution with the team from Skopje successfully punishing every mistake they made. After first 30 Vardar were 5 goals up.

During the second half of the match NEXE were able to reduce the gap to only 4 until final three minutes when Bozic-Pavletic netted to bring hosts to three. But unfortunately for home fans that was as far as they could go. In Vardar's team excellent was Croatian middle back Luka Cindric with nine goals. In NEXE's team Marin Vegar and Vedran Zrnic scored eight goals each.

Zdenko Kordi, NEXE coach:
In my opinion Vardar are now a much better team than the season before. After our win after Meshkov another triumph over favored opponent would not be a surprise. Our goal however was to play best we can against Vardar and that’s what we did but unfortunately only in some parts of the match. We’ve had four goal advantage after first 30 but after that we did not play our game. Vardar was simply waiting for our mistakes and was ready to punish them.

Gregor Lorger, NEXE goalkeeper:
We’ve opened the match very well. But we’ve had that bad period allowing Vardar to turn the match over and later maintain four or five goal advantage. They have more quality players than we do.

Raul Gonzales, Vardar coach:
We know that NEXE have an excellent team, especially after victory against Meshkov Brest. They’ve surprised us with 5-1 defense in the beginning. After that we’ve made some changes, played better and with a few counter-attacks we’ve made turnover. However, NEXE were good throughout all 60 minutes.

Luka Cindric, Vardar player:
We were physically and mentally empty after a very hard match in Zagreb. However, we didn’t want to lose another match. NEXE were better in the beginning of the match and were able to enlarge the gap. After that we’ve punished some of their technical mistakes taking control of the match with some easy goals.