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Podravka looked helpless a week ago in Hungary, the inexperienced back line was in huge problems with a deep and strong Hungarian defense, and today their efficiency may be a bit better since Thuringer's defense is not that deep as the one FTC forces, but unlike the Hungarian champions, the Germans force a faster game, they score a lot of goals from counterattacks and they have both wings functional which are their strongest weapon. Just like last season in Koprivnica, the Germans came with a roster of 11 players, but unlike last season they have all of the main game carriers on their count (except for the goalkeeper Kraus who had a single complete match from the start of the season), and they will come after Podravka from all of their positions. When they beat Podravka with +4 (at half-time they had +7) who had Tatari, Zivkovic, Elez, Covic and Trifunovic in their roster, I don't see a reason for them to repeat the same thing today. Details

Offered odds tell me that they are based too much on these two team's last year's results and are not the right reflection of current situation. Canakkale played two games in the new championship, lost at Galatasaray in the last round (1-3), and in the first one they won at home against a team from Trabzon, Idam Ocagi (3-0). The same Idan Ocagi quite easily defeated Nilufer 3-1 in the last round. Except in the first set which they lost by one, Trabzon were dominant in other three sets, the difference was especially big at the block where they won 10 points more than Nilufer (16-6). Let's get back to the first round and Canakkale's match against Trabzon which Canakkale won in straight sets. They dominated the serve in that match, haven't made a single reception mistake, and their offense, dominated by receiver Ana Starcevic and Uygur and Rucker, was much more efficient. The win was even greater if you know that Canakkale's second receiver wasn't playing, Cuban Wilma Salas Rosell, who was the best player in the second round against Galatasaray with 20 points. Nilufer, similarly as Canakkale, changed almost whole roster for this season and they started it with only two foreigners in the team, one of them is Ivana Milos who arrived just before the season started. Canakkale seem like a much more fit team at the start of the season, and we should follow up on that. Details

Skuru won the first leg game by 5 goals (30-25) seven days ago, which means the Turkish team has to try and make up for that. That should see them play a more dynamic game from the very start. That will definitely result in a lot of turnovres and a lot of chances to score from fastbreaks. The first-leg was full of those kind of situations, which is why Skuru's wings ended up being the most efficient players in the game. The pace of the first leg was for over 60 goals. It was 9-9 after the first 15 minutes, with goal keepers saving a single shot. The Turks kept on with the fast pace game, which cost them when at 12-11 for SKuru. The Swedes went on to slow the pace down and finish the first half at 22-14. Ardesen's team managed to get only 5 goals down in the end. Skuru's goal keeper Fernandez finished with brilliant 40% of saves . That says it all about the intensity of the Turkish offense. Turkish teams are traditionally are much more offense oriented home and this game should be no exception. Details

I am repeating the same prediction from over a month ago which fell for a single goal last time. Today we have a one goal less margin and it seems to me, an even cleaner situation than before the clash of strength between Viborg and Randers in the quarter-finals of the Danish Cup. In that cup match there were 50 goals in 55 minutes of the match, and in the last five minutes only two other goals were scored. Randers's players had seven missed offenses in that period, because of turnovers and goalkeeper Poulsen's defense - she was brilliant in that match with fantastic 23 saves, something it's going to be hard to repeat in this match. Statistically, and because of the game dynamics, that was a match for over 55 goals. Randers had a total of 53 shots, Viborg 50. All three of Randers's back players failed. Right back Dalby scored "only" five out of 13 shots, Westberg the miserable one out of six, and Mie Hojlund zero out of four! The last one scored seven goals out of nine tries in a match against Aarhus, the second middle back Schmumacher really raised the shape, especially after that cup match, and she is one of Randers's best player this month. If we add to it only two more facts, that Randers have the second best offense in the championship and that Viborg are still in the phase of getting their team ready, then the over has to repeat itself on this offered margin. Details

Dortmund have by far the best team in Geramany. They conceded only 22,5 goals on average after 4 rounds. That is no surprise and unexpected id we know that they have one of top European and German goal keepers Voltering and two well-experienced internationals (Nadornaja and Miller as central defenders). There is one more good quality backfield player with great defense potential (Schmele) which makes up a team that already beat Thruingen (defending champions) this season by conceding only 21 goals. Dortmund sometimes let go and lose focus when meeting teams below their quality level but they are serious when seriousness is due. This game against the Nudesliga runner-ups is definitely one of those games that demand focus, especially in defense. Buxtehuder don't have as good a choice of players as last season. They have a choice of maybe 8-9 players and their game relies on backfield players too much. Their offense has 2 goals more than Dortmund so far but it's still not efficient enough. Details

This tip is based exclusively on Larvik. The fact is, they don't have a proper substitute for right back Koren, who will be out until spring, while some other backfield players got injured as well. That caused Larvik a lot of problems in the opening match with Rostov. I expect similar problems against the tricky Romanian champions. Larvik's coach knows that they will have a hard time beating Baia Mare with a 35-year-old middle backs who spend a lot of energy in offense and Frafjor who struggles as the pivot. New player Graesholt is not even close to the efficiency of Koren. He has only Mork to rely on in offense. That means the defense has to do very well, which Larvik's defense is capable of. 27 goals conceded in the Rostov match is not to much given the fact Toft didn't save almost anything. She will most likely not do as badly today. Larvik limited Baia Mare at 23 goals last season. The Romanians force their game through backfield shooters. Abbingh sometimes takes too many shots, Pineaua played her best match in two years against Krim, but Krim are not Larvik's level. It is therefore still unknown how good she can actually do. To sum up, even though it's only round two, Larvik cannot allow two opening Champions League defeats. To avoid that, they need to play very good defense. Details

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This is a clash between the top Danish offense (Esbjerg, average of 30 goals per game) and the second best Danish defense (Aarhus, concede 23 goals on average). It seems like we are to expect a game that will go over the set margin. After the problems Esbjerg had with their key middle back Grigel (off the team following a conflict with the coach), Esbjerg's offense was expected to struggle in the last round. But on the contrary, it did brilliantly. There are a quite a few indications that their coach risked like that on purpose to push his three backfield players Polman, Alm and Riegelhuth. Polmand and Riegelhuth fired 20 shots in the Nykobing match to score a total of 17 goals. Van der Heijden is averaging 5 goals per game, which is a good contribution as well. Esbjerg's coach wants his team to do even better in offense. The home team have league's top scorer Okkels (8 goals per game) and the most talented right back Christensen, who does not play defense. Starting middle back Pontoppidan is back at full power after spending less time on the floor in the past few games due to an injury. Neither team underwent many chances over the summer. These are the final scores of their last season games (28-25, 28-30). Details

Podravka don't have enough quality players nor team and individual experience to compete with quality for 60 minutes in this Champions League group in general, and not only in today's game against reigning Hungarian champions, and I expect these mentioned weaknesses to become even more obvious in their away games. In the last two seasons, in all of their away games, Podravka have never lost by less than six goals, and most of their defeats were in double digits. They are going into this season with a new team, a completely new back line which needs time to start playing together well and they are currently nowhere near coach Goran Mrdjen's imagined projection. FTC are a team that have width, experience, they have been together for years, almost whole Hungarian national team. During the pre-season, they defeated Podravka twice even by making some calculations, but there will be no calculations today. When they 'smell blood' they can run over their opponents, and today's match seems like it could be like that, and it has great preconditions for a double digit win. Details

Oldenburg are currently playing the best handball in the German championship, they are on a momentum and that needs to be used. On Wednesday, in a duel between two undefeated teams, they defeated Metzingen (48-34) and they are at the top of the league after four rounds. Today they are facing Buxtehuder, current German Cup holders, who are nowhere near the same level as last season. They lost several key players, they replaced them with players from their junior selection, and especially visible is the problem of pivot. After three rounds, they have only one win and two defeats, one against above mentioned Metzingen (21-25) whom Buxtehuder defeated a few days ago. Oldenburg will be playing without two players today, left wing Kim Birke for whom they have no alternative, and back Julia Wenzl, who has decent playing time. They have the width to compensate for her absence. At Buxtehuder, injury problems can seriously affect their result in today's game. Captain Isabell Klein is absent because of a muscle injury, and she is an important player for them in both directions. Two more players missed practices this week, Jessica Oldenburg and Maxi Hayn and it is unsure whether they will play today. Buxtehuder have a limited roster and a rotation of 8-9 players without and real quality on the bench, so the only thing they can rely on today is tradition of good results in their games against Oldenburg. But in today's game and under these circumstances, doesn't give them any advantage. In favor of Oldenburg winning today is also the result from a pre-season tournament two weeks before the season started where Oldenburg defeated Buxtehuder 18-15. Details

There are a few reasons that make me expect an under today. First of all, Larvik no longer have as many players as in previous years. Middle back Anja Edin won't play today, which means quite slow and quite old Breivang and Hammerseng will be in charge at that position. This will be Larvik's first match without right back Koren in years. She will be out in until the start of the next year and Larvik simply do not have a proper substitute for her. On the other hand, Rostov have one of the top goal keepers in the world. Her quality is even more important today since she is one of top options at Norway's national team. That means she can probably guess where shots by her colleagues from the national team, who are at Larvik today, will go even with her eyes closed. Details

Besides great history, Krim have nothing else to offer not only tonight, but the Champions League this year in general. The pressure will be big for 4-5 players - Mavsar, Bajramovska, Milanović-Litre and Omoregie are players who stand out, but Krim don't have experience or width on their bench, they've got problematic positions in the team, especially the right back. The results were far from ideal in the preseason, and the beginning of the Slovenian championship is the same. They played a tie against Zagorje (22-22), barely beat Velenje (32-29) after losing by two in the first part. Baia Mare renewed their entire roster, but considering their championship started early and they had to play the qualifiers, they started getting ready early on. They started the season by winning the Supercup, beat their big rival CSM Bucurest in the final (31-26). They played the perfect CL qualifiers last month, and crushed the Danish Esbjerg in the final (32-21). They've got seven wins in seven matches of the national championship, all by five or more goals difference. They've got two good players for almost every position, and are a much better team whatever way you look at it right now, in the margins of seven to ten goals difference. Details

Esbjerg's main player, Lotte Grigel, and their coach Frederiksen aren't getting along, to say the least, and Nykobing will try to take advantage of that. Grigel is not playing, and Nykobing will use fast game and fastbreaks to try to win. Their offense is the third most efficient (Esbjerg's is second), but they also have more shots, the best assistant of the league, and one of the fastest middle backs, Kristina Kristansen. The second most efficient player, Mette Gravholt pointed out that they have to use their fast game. She also mentioned the preseason game where Esbjerg beat Nykobing 33-29. The fact that left back Estevana Polman will be playing the middle back for Esbjerg toady won't influence her regular statistics. She directed the game most of the time against Holstebro, too, and still had her average 12 shots. ALso, now the back scorers Jehny Alm and Betina Riegelhuth have more room. If Nykobing can impose their rhythm and dictate the game, and I don't see why they wouldn't, we can expect this match to end close to 60 goals. Details

Fourth round brings about a duel between two of the four teams that are so far undefeated in the German League, and I see several reasons because of which I believe we will see a game with at least 2 or three goals less than the u/o margin set. Both teams had 11 players that had obligations with their national teams, four in Oldenburg and seven in Metzingen, two games, difficult weekend and travel. One of these players, Oldenburg's left winger Kim Birke, returned injured and she won't be playing today. Kim Birke is the player who spent the most time on the court, she is the third best scorer in the team with 14 goals and according to the home team's coach, a player 'they have no alternative for'. Since we're talking about injuries, back Carolina Muller who performed great in the first two rounds is questionable, she scored 7 against Goppingen and 11 against the Champions, Thuringer. After that game, she suffered a ligament injury that demanded a four week long break, she started training this week, but it's hard to expect that she will play today. HEr absence reflected on their next game, in Berlin against Fuchse, Oldenburg won (25-23), but they had problems and lacked options in the offense. On the other side, Metzingen are a team that conceded the lest goals at the start of the season, 68, that is on average 23 goals per game, with a stable goalkeeping duo Jankovic - Stockhorts who are playing together for the second season. To sum it up, a great timing for a game at around 50 goals. Details

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It's the start of the Turkish season, and I chose a match in which I see overestimation of the away team from Trabzon. Favoring of Idmanocagi is based on two reasons. The first one concerns the players. Over the Summer, Trabzon acquired two notable players, Sanja Malagurski who can play well as the receiver and as Opposite, and receiver Jelena Blagojevic. They are both members of the Serbian national team, and they weren't a part of their nations successful actions in the last few months, either because of an injury (Malagurski missed the better part of last season), and because Serbia currently has better receivers than Blagojevic. There is no doubt in their quality, but in Malagurski's form. The second reason is concerned with results, Idmanocagi won the Balkans Cup at the end of the last month, first they defeated Romanian Targu Mures 3-1 in the semi-final, and then Serbian Zeleznicar from Lajkovac 3-0 and secured a spot in the Challenge Cup. I don't want to diminish the worth of these wins, but the fact is that both of those opponents are nowhere near the European quality level, they are not even among the top 4 teams in their national leagues, so these results are not a good parameter for Trabzon's quality. The third foreigner in Trabzon's team is Sonja Milanovic, a receiver from Bosnia and Herzegovina, who played for the American University of Arkansas for a few years.
If we compare these two teams, they both completely changed their rosters. Canakkale also acquired three good foreigners, Cuban receiver Willma Salas Rosell who played for Rabita Baku in the Champions League last season, Croat Ana Starcevic who ended last season with great performances in Besiktas, and American Gwen Rucker who played in Azerbaijan a few years ago. Now, if we compare the Turkish players in both teams, I think the home team has a big advantage there. Their opposite is Ceren Kestirengoz, 191 cm tall, former Vakif player, second opposite of the Turkish national team which won the silver a month ago in the European League. Their second opposite is Selin Uygur, Vakif player for a brief time, played for Yesilyurt last year and finished the season in Canakkale: Their Libero is Cayirgan who played for Galata and Fenerbahce. In Trabzon, one of the middle blockers is Sinem Barut, experienced long-term member of Galatasaray, second middle back is Sipahoglu, an experienced but not as agile player. I see problems in the setter position where their first option is Cinar Ceren, a player with no first league experience and with a lack of height, second problem is the position of libero where they have Esepasa, a 41-year-old player. She was the weakest link at receiving In those two Balkans Cup games we mentioned earlier and she made 14 mistakes overall in those two matches.
Competitively, Canakkale played over ten pre-season games, won two out of three tournaments they competed on, at one tournament at the end of last month, they defeated Eczaciabashi 3-2 and Galatasary 3-0. I take into consideration that both of those teams that belong to the Top 4 in Turkish league played without a lot of players who were at the European Championship at the time, but those are results that carry great value and I see the same happening for the home team in today's match.
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Portugal's handball players have shown a lot of weaknesses in their game against Russia, they were physically inferior and tactically unprepared. Today they are facing an even harder task. Denmark's new selector bases his concept on offensive defense, against which Turkey had a lot of problems a few days ago. As far as the Danish offense is concerned, their selector said in a statement after the game that he wasn't pleased that 'his players were satisfied with a nine goal lead and they could have won by 15', and we can conclude from it that they will try and get maximum efficiency from their offense today. Another thing is in favor of this, and that is the fact that left back Sophie Okkels in the roster for today's game, she is currently the best scorer in Danish championship, and she will be motivated to present her efficiency and great form in the national kit. Even though their last two head-to-head games were back in 2009, we should mention that both of them finished with Denmark's win (by 17 and by 18 goals). Today I expect a win by at least 15 goals. Details

This is a match in which Turkey have nothing to lose, the fact is that they are not at the same quality level as Denmark and Russia and their target in these qualifications are the two games against Portugal next Spring. They announce that they will play without pressure today, that they will try and parry the Russians with the pace, and they are hoping for better efficiency in offense which is always in the forefront, especially when they are the home team. On the other hand, the pace they announced will bring about even more technical faults which the Russians will easily punish. After only three games at the previous European Championship where they were eliminated in the group stage, they were the team that scored the most goals from counterattacks. In the game against Portugal at the start of these qualifications, they scored from all positions, and since it is know that quality of the Turkish defense is technically and tactically not as good as in some of the top European teams, I expect that they will concede a lot of goals against Russian players. Over on the margin offered in the preview. Details

A margin that is worth betting on for three reasons. First, both teams are missing goalkeeping options, in Romania their first keeper Ungureanu is absent, in Belarus two standard goalkeepers, Safonova and Abramovich. Second, Belarus have five overs on this margin in the last five games, eight in the last ten games, including the two head-to-head games between these two teams last year, one of which finished at 58 in Belarus, and the second one at 52 in Romania. There were some other friendly matches over the last year, but they were all at the margin of 60 goals or more. Third reason, Romania had almost 60 shots three days ago against Lithuania, they missed six 7 meter throws, Belarus were over 50, both teams made around ten technical fouls which opens the path for easy goals. We can expect the same tendency in today's game. Details