Meshkov wants a new win, Vojvodina's mission to improve form
Belarus Meshkov will with a match against the Serbian champion Vojvodina (Wednesday 18 hour, local time) open the second part of SEHA GSS league's season. Team from Brest must enter into a winning series if they want to stay in the game for a place which leads to the Final Four tournament in April.
After winning three of their last four away games, they will now play three games in home hall "Victoria " in Brest. The first opponent is the Serbian champion Vojvodina, and after them Lovcen and Metalurg.
Meshkov is now stronger for two new players; pivot Rastko Stojkovic and left hand Dejan Malinovic but they have problem with Vyacheslav Shumak's injury.
He has broken his finger and injured ligament on the middle finger of his throwing hand on tournament in Hungary on preparations with national team for EURO of 2014. He will be out of squad for at least six weeks.
Preparing for new challenges, Meshkov played two games with Ukrainian Motor, and lost twice (33-39 and 22-27)
Vojvodina will be led by coach Djordje Cirkovic, but he will not count on the middle back Saso Majanc who is the only player to leave Novi Sad.
In their only preparation match against Vrbas, home team Vojvodina had no problems, winning with 26-17. The main goal of the team is primarily to defend domestic title reach better ranking in SEHA GSS league in their debut season.
Zeljko Babic - Meshkov coach
- Team has had full training only three days ago, and that will be one of the major challenges for us. We know that we are playing better. Our mission versus Vojvodina is to win the game. We need triumph to stay in position to fight for Final Four place. I count on Rastko Stojkovic from the very first minute, and hope Malinovic will get some chance.
Maxim Baranau - Meshkov player
- After EURO in Denmark I'm in good shape. Team is in a great mood. Everyone knows what we need to do, know what to expect from opponents. I think we will win. The game, which we had against Vojvodina in Novi Sad has shown that we are much stronger.
Djordje Cirkovic - Vojvodina coach:
We're still in the phase of selecting and completing the team for upcoming competitions. We've had only 20 days of preparations. Our expectations for the match against Meshkov are just to show our maximum at the moment, and to show improvements in tactical part of the game. We can benefit from the SEHA GSS league only if we manage to be equal opponent against better teams. Meshkov Brest has a lot of very good players and only thing I ask of my players is to fight and give their best on Wednesday
Uros Elezovic - Vojvodina player:
Our last official game was at the beginning of December, so we're our looking forward to the start of the second part of the season. First match is against excellent team of Meshkov Brest. We've lost in Novi Sad very easy and now want to show that we can play better than we did in the first match. We will give our maximum on Wednesday and hope for the good result