The first weekend was mostly true to form, with only a few minor surprises. As expected, all of the 1st or 2nd seeded teams won their games vs 3rd or 4th seeded teams and in most cases by large margins. There were, however a few surprises elsewhere, with Group C’s #2 seed Kolding (Denmark) easily beating #1 Chambery in France, by a score of 32-26 being the biggest. Kolding, was a 1.5 goal underdog going into the match, but clearly dominated Chambery in all phases of the game. There were also a few outright wins by #4 seed vs #3 seeds: Romania’s Constanta’s victory over Banik Karvina in the Czech Republic and Sarajevo’s win over Bystrica in Slovakia.

Next weekend’s key matchups:
Group C: KIF Kolding Elite A/S (DEN) vs Wisla Plock S.A. (POL): Both teams are coming off big wins and will battle it out for first place in Group C
Group C: Crvena Zvezda Beograd (SRB) vs Chambery Savoie HB (FRA): Gut check time for Jackson Richardson and company. Belgrade is the 4th seeded team and were beaten soundly by Wisla Plock, but playing in Belgrade is always a challenge.
Group E: C.S. HCM Constanta (ROM) vs GOG Svendborg TGI Gudme (DEN): Svendborg will try and bounce back from a home loss to Kiel. Constanta, the 4th seed will try to make it to 2-0 in front of a home crowd.
Group G: FC Barcelona-Cifec (ESP) vs Hammarby IF HB (SWE) : Battle for first place in Group H
Group A: RK "Bosna" Sarajevo (BIH) vs Portland San Antonio (ESP): 4th seeded Sarajevo will try to go 2-0 in Group A against top seeded Portland San Antonio. Portland will be a big favorite, but a road trip to Sarajevo is never easy.
Group D: RK Zagreb (CRO) vs Chehovskie Medvedi (RUS): Top seeded Zagreb needs to defend home court against the top team from Russia