Sports Flash

A roundup of major performances lately obtained by athletes and teams from Romania

Florin Orban, 23.01.2025, 13:45

The Australian Open, the year’s first Grand Slam Tournament has reached its semifinals. Unfortunately, the last Romanian in the competition, Gabriela Ruse, failed to qualify for this stage of the competition in the women’s double. In spite of putting up a good show, she and her Ukrainian team mate Marta Kostyuk eventually conceded defeat in the quarterfinals to Su-Wei Hsieh of Taiwan and Jelena Ostapenko, of Latvia, 6-2, 5-7, 7-5. The entire match lasted 2 hours and 20 minutes. Ruse and Kostyuk walked away with a check of 142 thousand Australian dollars and 430 WTA points in the doubles ranking. The pair has already played in two Grand Slam semis, one in Melbourne, in 2023, and another one in Roland Garros, in 2024.

In the men’s basketball Group B of EuroCup, U-BT Cluj-Napoca secured a home win against Turk Telekom Ankara, 94-81. That was the last home match for the Romanian champions. The best U-BT player was American Dennis Seeley with 31 points. After 16 legs, U-BT ranks 5^th in the standings with 9 wins and 7 defeats. Next Tuesday, U-BT will be up against Lietkabelis Panevezys, in Lithuania and on February 5^th they will be taking on Aris Thessaloniki in Greece. The first two sides will directly qualify for the quarterfinals and the following four will be competing in the play-offs.

The ice hockey side Fenestela 68 Sfântu Gheorghe on Wednesday obtained a surprising result in Romania’s National Ice Hockey Championship; a 3-2 away win against the championship’s leader, ACSH Gheorgheni. The Harghita side remains in the first place with 55 points out of 26 games, followed by Corona Braşov, with 53 points out of 23 matches.

In a top game of the 15^th leg of the National League in women’s handball, Corona Braşov, secured a 33-29 win against SCM Râmnicu Vâlcea, one of Romania’s representative in the EHF European League. The second Romanian side in the continental competition, Dunărea Brăila, clinched a 30-22 victory against HC Zalau. Two sides playing for Romania in the Champions League have also obtained victories. CSM Bucharest has outperformed CSM Slatina, 41-29, while Rapid Bucharest has secured a 32-24 win against CSM Târgu Jiu. CSM Bucharest tops the ranking with 39 points, followed by Corona, with 31.

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