Athlete of the week
Handball player Cristina Neagu
Florin Orban, 09.01.2024, 15:38
The recently-held IHF World Women’s Championship brought the women’s international competition season to a standstill for about
a month. The season has been resumed, with a new stage as part of the European
Cups.
Five Romanian teams have been proving their
mettle in the Champions league and the EHF European League, respectively. They
are CSM Bucharest, Rapid Bucharest, Dunarea Braila, Gloria Bistrita and CSM
Targu Jiu.
CSM Bucharest this past weekend had an
excellent run, trouncing Montenegro’s Buducnost
Podgorica, 44 to 26. CSM was lucky
enough to have Cristina Neagu on the lineup, in top shape. At the recently-held World
Championships, Cristina was part of the lineup but she played one single
game, the fixture against Germany in the main group, having incompletely
recovered from an injury. In this past Sunday’s game, Cristina Neagu was again
her team’s top handballer, and the seven goals she scored mattered a lot in CSM’s
confrontation against Buducnost.
Reason enough for Radio Romania International
to designate Cristina Neagu the Athlete of the week.
Cristina Neagu was
born in Bucharest, on August 26, 1988. She made her debut with the School
Sports Club number 5. In 2006, Cristina Neagu turned pro, being signed up by
Rulmentul from Brasov, then she had a stint with Oltchim Râmnicu Vâlcea. In
2010, playing for Oltchim, Cristina Neagu reached as far as the Champions League
final. When Oltchim was dismantled, Neagu was signed up by Buducnost Podgorica,
winner of the Champions League in 2015. Since 2017, Cristina Neagu has been
playing for CSM Bucharest. In 2010, 2015, 2016 și 2018, the IHF designated
Cristina Neagu the world’s best handballer. Cristina thus became the first
handballer in history who won the title four times. After the IHF Women’s World
Championship in December, when the Romanian national team wasted the
opportunity to qualify to the Olympic Games in Paris, Cristina Neagu announced her
retirement from the national team.
As a Romanian national
team player, Cristina Neagu won two bronze medals, in 2010, at the European
Championship, jointly hosted by Denmark and Norway, and at the World
Championship in Denmark, in 2015.
