The result underlines Hungary’s credentials as medal contenders, and leaves Montenegro preparing for a crucial game against France on Friday.
GROUP I
Hungary vs Montenegro 26:20 (16:11)
- in a first half full of turnarounds, the Montenegrins held a four-goal lead (2:6) in the sixth minute, but the co-hosts mounted a full comeback later and had a decent five-goal lead at half-time
- Montenegro endured a goalless period from the 15th until the 25th minute, while Hungary went on a 6:0 run
- Katrin Klujber, Csenge Kuczora and Viktória Gyori-Lukács scored four goals each in the opening half
- Zsófi Szemerey played a key role in Hungary's win, making 15 saves (44.1 per cent save efficiency) and was crowned Player of the Match, presented by Grundfos
- a hard-working Djurdjina Jaukovic was again Montenegro's top scorer, netting five goals, but missing a further six
- Milena Raicevic was part of the squad, but the Montenegrin captain did not play a single minute
One defensive wall falls and another rises
At the beginning of the match, it seemed like Hungary’s attack would be the next to fall in front of the Montenegrin wall formed by Tatjana Brnovic and Djurdjina Jaukovic.
However, although it took them quite some time to find a way through, they did it. The Hungarian attacking trio of Csenge Kuczora, Petra Vamos and Katrin Klujber got creative as the minutes went by and the talented backline used their pace to find space and score, while on the other side of the court, Zsófi Szemerey built a wall of her own.
Their combined efforts ensured Hungary stayed unbeaten and perfect at the Women's EHF EURO 2024.
I think our strength today was the team spirit and the fight, we were fighting like hell and knew exactly that we had to be really aggressive in our defence and we really tried our best to stop the Montenegrin players.
They did not surprise us, we expected everything that they did, but at that moment we were not ready to stop it. We now need to think about the match tomorrow, we need to see what was bad in this match so we don’t repeat this tomorrow.
