KOMETAL THROUGH TO THE CL SEMIFINAL AFTER ANEXTREMELY NARROW OVERALL VICTORY

Although the Macedonian club, Kometal GP Skopje, lostthe second quarterfinal match against Krim Mecrator in Ljubljana, they neverthelessadvanced to semifinal due to the outcome from both matches (45:44). Krim lost hopein first half and showed, to a sell out crowd, an extremely poor performance.

COMPLETE MACEDONIAN CONTROL

In the sold out hall in Tivoli where some 4500spectators prepared to give support to their favourite team, the match actuallybegan much better for guests from Skopje. Both teams started with an aggressivedefence but Kometal's 6-0 formations were more effective. Even though Krim'scoach, Tone Tiselj, started with the seven best players, they were not able toscore more than once in ten minutes.  Onthe other side, the Kometal players were more or less constantly finding a freespace in Krim's defence. With goals of Todorovska, Radchenko, Bujanova andOzel, Kometal was leading in 15th minute by 6:2 and Tiselj was forced to taketime-out.  Well, but it did not helpmuch too them. Krim was not playing up to their usual standards. They werealways trying to get closer to Kometal but only in 34th minute, they were ableto minimize gap to one goal (10:11). Kometal's coach Andriy Portnoy once againput everything on stopping Ludmila Bodnieva and he succeeded because she scoredonly once in 60 minutes. The biggest advantage for Skopje was in 25th minutewhen Olea Tsygitsa scored and which bought the result to10: 5, the first halfended with Kometal leading by 11:8. It was obvious that Skopje's players were totallyin control of a match.

TIME RUNS OUT FOR KRIM

The Balkan clash between the two states of formerYugoslavia was little bit more exciting in second half, or at the very least inthe last five minutes of match. Before that, Krim Mercator did not findsolutions to the aggressive and powerful Kometal defence. Marina Vergelyuk,Olena Yatsenko, Anja Freser, Deja Doler, Tanja Oder and Natalija Derepasko didnot have any ideas in regards to attack and besides, they did not once use theirstrongest »weapon« counter-attack. Therefore, the result was always in favourof guests. Nevertheless, after entering the final ten minutes of the game, withsome good defensive tactics, Krim was able to equalize for the second time in thematch. With penalty throw three minutes, later Derepasko had a chance to giveKrim first lead, but the Kometal goalkeeper Borysenko was too good. She savedit and took every hope from Krim to make a turnaround. With three consecutive goalsof Anna Ejsmont Krim won the match 23:21 but this was not enough to go anyfurther in the Champions League competition. This was a big day for Kometal. Theparty had begun – the players were enormously excited and happy.

After the match Nataliya Borysenko of Kometal said:»I cannot describe this feeling. I am very happy. I think this was the finalbefore the final. But I think we deserved to go further in the semifinal.«

Krim's players were crying long time after the match.They had higher hopes and expectations, but were not able to execute them.Krim's captain Deja Doler was not hiding her disappointment: »I am sad andangry at the same time. I do not know what was happening. This was not Krim youknow.«

Text: Maja Mastnak, SiOL-Sportal