Pascual is now known as the head coach of One Veszprém HC, who were knocked out of the 2024/25 title race in one of the most thrilling quarter-final battles of the season, versus Magdeburg. His previous roles include leading Dinamo Bucuresti and the Romania men’s national team.
Pascual’s presentation began with a look at the numbers surrounding situations of numerical superiority and inferiority during the Machineseeker EHF Champions League 2024/25 Group Phase, breaking down the performance by team in this area.
The data provided interesting insights into the teams, showing which clubs were consistently able to capitalise on superiority in defence or offence compared to when they have equal numbers on court. Pascual himself was surprised to see that some teams showed even more efficiency in attack when playing without their goalkeeper in a situation of a two-minute suspension for a field player — Zagreb, Kielce and Kolstad.
When facing numerical inferiority in defence, no team compared to Füchse, who were the clear leaders in terms of capitalising on six-versus-five situations and seven-against-six.
After a look at the numbers from the group phase, Pascual shared different options for systems to use in the various situations of numerical inequality. He stressed that there are of course a multitude of ways a system can play out and that for him, the most important player is the one with the responsibility for the decision.
“For me, the key player in six-against-five is the one who decides,” he said. “All the teams, we are playing the same actions. It’s not about the actions. It’s about the details of the actions.”
Following the presentation, the Q&A saw a variety of questions sent from participants. Questions ranged from the specific topic at hand to training defence, different match situations, the merits of the varied defensive formations, qualities of players and how Pascual prepares for a match.
Just one example of a topic of interest raised during the Q&A was how to replicate match pressure in training, which Pascual finds basically impossible at his level — nothing in training can be exactly like what it is to be on court in front of thousands of vocal spectators when the end of the season is at stake.
“This mental pressure that we have, it’s very difficult to reproduce in practice,” said Pascual. “We must try to be close to the game, but it’s never the same.”
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