Lasse Andersson was the best thrower in Berlin with eight goals Photo: City Press
By Nicolas Sowa
Füchse Berlin remain in the title race of the Handball Bundesliga. The Berliners won on Thursday evening in front of 7373 spectators in the Max-Schmeling-Halle against HC Erlangen with 39:30 (19:13).
As a result, the capital city team, third in the table, is hot on the heels of THW Kiel and SC Magdeburg. The best Berlin throwers were Lasse Andersson with eight goals and Fabian Wiede with seven goals.
For the hosts, regular keeper Dejan Milosavljev was back after recovering from an ankle injury. Lasse Ludwig, who was so strong against Flensburg, was initially given preference.
And the 20-year-old youngster followed on from that with seven saves in the first half. The foxes quickly took a 4:1 lead, were very attentive in defence, and effective in attack.
Fabian Wiede contributed seven goals – the second best thrower from Berlin Photo: City Press
But then the mistakes began to pile up. Erlangen came back to 6:5. The foxes, however, remained calm. After almost 16 minutes they were able to break away again with a 6:1 run.
The Franconians kept getting stuck in the Berlin cover and thus brought the hosts to easy goals through speed counterattacks. With a better exploitation of chances, even a higher break lead would have been possible.
And that gave Erlangen new impetus. Up to 20:16 the guests came back after the change of sides. In this phase it was mainly thanks to goalkeeper Ludwig that the lead did not shrink any further.
The foxes then acted more concentrated in attack and were able to break away again to 30:22 after about 45 minutes. After that, they brought the victory to the finish without getting into any danger.