RRI Sports Club – Handball

A look at the Romanian team performing in European interclub competitions

Florin Orban, 02.04.2025, 13:45

At the level of national clubs, Romanian women’s handball remains at the top of European rankings. Three Romanian teams this year reached the quarter-finals of Champions League and the EHF European League, the two main continental competitions. Bucharest, Râmnicu Vâlcea and, more recently, Brăila are now recognized as centers of European handball, even if Dunărea Brăila plays its European matches in Buzău. Dunărea Brăila has progressed enormously in recent years. In 2008, the team reached the semi-finals of the Challenge Cup. Last year, it reached the final four tournament of the EHF European League, where it ranked last. This year, it missed qualification to the final four due to a goal conceded in the last second of the return leg against the Danish side Ikast. SCM Râmnicu Vâlcea was not far from the final tournament of the EHF European League either. In the quarterfinals match against Thüringer, they lost away by 6 goals, and at home they won by only two.

In Champions League, CSM Bucharest qualified to the quarterfinals after a play-off against Bucharest rivals Rapid, which they clearly won in both legs. Cristina Neagu continued to be the team’s number one player, even though she is at the end of her career. Aged 37, the athlete announced her retirement at the end of this season, so she is facing her last chance to win the Champions League with CSM Bucharest. Neagu has already won the League trophy, 10 years ago with Buducnost Podgorica. A year later, CSM Bucharest also won the trophy, without Neagu in the lineup.

In the quarterfinals, CSM will take on Team Esbjerg of Denmark. The first leg is scheduled on April 20 in Bucharest, while the return leg will be played in Denmark a week later. Let us also note that the two teams have previously met in the quarterfinals of the competition, in 2022 and 2023, with the Danish club winning both times. (VP)