SC Magdeburg has three away games in a row. Before there are two derbies, the Champions League is on the agenda on Wednesday evening. At Pick Szeged, the SCM wants to keep its clean slate and “be there on point”.
Five games in twelve days, four of them in a different hall – a challenge for Bennet Wiegert as a coach. “We now have to push through and try to be there at the moment,” said Wiegert before the flight to Budapest. From the Hungarian capital we head to Szeged, where the defending champions want to be successful in the current Champions League season on matchday five on Wednesday (October 15th, 6:45 p.m. live in the audio stream and ticker). There were four wins from the first four games. The Hungarians got four points from their first four games.
Calendar packed to the brim, travel kilometers en masse
Given the busy schedule, there is hardly any time for training. Wiegert can count the number of units he has played so far this season on one hand. Also after the games at Pick Szeged, on Sunday at DHfK Leipzig (October 19th, 4:00 p.m. live on MDR TELEVISION), in the cup at Dessau-Rosslauer HV the following Tuesday (October 21st, 7:00 p.m. live on the ticker), against HC Eurofarm Pelister two days later (October 23rd, 8:45 p.m. listen live and on the ticker) and on October 26th at TSV Hanover-Burgdorf (4:30 p.m. live in the ticker) Wiegert will not be able to do proper training. Then there is an international break, but “there are no players there during the national team week,” says the coach.
Which also makes another component that is important to Wiegert difficult to work on: the players’ mental freshness. In team meetings and individual conversations, he tries to listen to the players. “Sometimes it’s more difficult to manage than the physical strain,” says Wiegert, who “would like to do a lot more in the mental area. We don’t work on the head enough in modern society.”
No Training content Carry into play
In the last game against Bergischen HC or next week in the cup with the second division team DRHV Wiegert did not want and does not want to experiment or bring any training content into the game. “Because I simply have an appreciation for the character of the game and, above all, respect for every opponent. And a game remains something special. A game remains a highlight, remains a goal that we work towards.”
No more seeing Smarason
The next highlight is now called Pick Szeged. An opponent that Wiegert warns is highly demanding. Last season the Hungarians narrowly failed in the quarter-finals against Barcelona. “And without any major changes, I still see them as a possible participant in a Champions League Final Four in terms of their squad.” The SCM coach places a particular focus on Jim Gottfridsson. The Swede came to southern Hungary in the summer after twelve years at SG Flensburg-Handewitt. And it is “irreplaceable” there, says Wiegert.
Jim Gottfridsson shook up the HBL for years. He went to Hungary in the summer and is a key player at Szeged.
Also because ex-Magdeburg player Janus Smarason Szeged is missing due to injury and another backcourt player, Lazar Kukic, is in danger of being out. Gottfridsson is “the player they need, who also has to be in good form, to score for them, to win for them.” He has an “incredible importance for her at such an early stage after the change.”
The 2022 European champion and MVP of the tournament should be the focus of Wiegert and his team. And if we manage to stop him, the fifth win in the fifth game awaits. And thus a next step towards the big goal: defending the title in the premier class.
Janus Smarason (right) played in Magdeburg for a year and won the double before moving to Pick Szeged in Hungary.
jar/dpa
