On the eve of the Final4 coaches, players and experts coincide in pointing out that during the weekend everything can happen. The equality between teams have to be decided in small details that makes it clear to more in favoured than others.
When a team gets to the Final4 of the EHF Champions League all that was played previously it doesn’t count, only in the last 120 minutes will judge who will be the European Champion. So much so that since they’ve established the last four format, back in the season 2009/2010 in one occasion they lifted the title up to the Lanxess Arena with better results.
The only team that managed to be victorious was one of the Final4 with the best results and other three participants were THW Kiel season 2011/2012 where they reached with only one defeat and two draws and they finished the victory against the Atlético de Madrid before that game they lost to two matches.
That success of the THW Kiel arrived at the Lanxess Arena the best out of the four participants it’s so unusual that in other occasions it has conquered the title with the worst results. This has happened in three occasions.
From the 6 editions of the Final4 of the EHF Champions League which have already been played the title went to the team that had won the less matches to reach the semi-finals. In the season 2010/2011 the FC Barcelona reached Cologne with 4 lost matches and 3 draws in the season 2012/2013 the HSV Handball fell to 3 matches and had drawn two others, in the season 2013/2014 the SG Flensburg-Handwett conquered the title having lost to 3 matches and drawn to only 1.
Knowing all of this you might ask questions. Which team is the one with better results? And the one with the worst results? The answer is 3 out of the 4 participants lost 2 matches before they got to the final. The difference is to point out that the team with best results we have them in the score draw, and the PSG Handball has only drawn in 1 match, before the HC PPD Zagreb in the quarter finals.
On the contrary, the team has walked out in Cologne with the worse results in the THW Kiel, up to now in the competition has lost a lot of matches more than 3 teams up to date the team has arrived at the Final4 losing more games would have been FC Barcelona in the season 2010/2011 with 4. But with a lot the THW Kiel has improved, before the semi- finals has lost 7 matches. It’s actually true with the new format the EHF Champions League the German team played 4 matches more than regular ones anyway it seems significant that has fell in 7 matches out of 18 played.
Thus theses results and previous results we have got, can we say that Joan Cañellas is the favourite to establish a title? Can he win the EHF Champions League winning 12 out of 20 disputed matches?
Edu Agulló | @Eduagullo
