Summary of the 1st round – full triumph of the Croats

After Friday's derby, which was won by Jadran (HN) in their pool against Mladost, Saturday completed the 1st round of the new competition season in the Premier League. From the Croatian point of view, a great day with all four victories of our teams, two of which were more or less expected (Jadran from Split and Jug Adriatic osiguranje from Dubrovnik), also at home, but especially happy celebration of Rijeka's Primorje EB in Kragujevac nad Radnički, as well as Solaris in Belgrade near Crvena zvezda. Let's start in chronological order.

Jadran on turbo power
The current champion of Croatia, Jadran from Split, hosted a very young Valis team from Valjevo in the Poljud pool, which on paper is perhaps the weakest team in the Premier League. Admittedly, this was not noticeable in the first two quarters. In them, the home team was in the lead the whole time, but the visitors also constantly equalized - from 1:0 to 1:1, then 2:1 and 2:2 and all in that order until 4:3 after two quarters, and then...
Then Jadran turned on the turbo-jets and scored 8 consecutive goals, up to 12:3! In the last minute, the guest managed to score one goal after 16 minutes of fasting (they were scoreless in the second quarter as well), but the people of Split also added another. In the third quarter, even 9:1 for Jadran, and in total before the last section, 13:4. Finished story. Coach Marelj gave a chance to all players, including second goalkeeper Martin Čelar, and only Toni Radan and Antonio Dužević scored goals for Jaran (with the exception of the goalkeeper).

Jugaši celebrated in the score review

It is not the same, but in a certain way similar story in Gruž. The current Croatian runner-up also defeated the guest from Serbia (Sabac), who also never led. In fact, he didn't even equalize. The people of Dubrovnik "kept" the opponent constantly at a distance of 4-5, even with a 6-goal lead. Toni Mozara, along with guest Luka Pljevančić, was the first scorer of the match with 5 goals. More precisely, he shared that unofficial title.

Their lack of play may not have been felt too much in the beginning, especially not in the second quarter. The home team won that section 5:1, a total of 8:4 in the half. After three quarters, the home team still had +4 (10:6), and they thought they had their situation under control. What a mistake! The tenacious young people from Rijeka did not give up and with goals from Brubnjak, Rakovac and Crippa from the penalty box they reduced the score to 10:9, and then through Marin Dašić they leveled at 10:10 exactly 36 seconds to the end! The coastal team "led" the match to a penalty shoot-out in which Mauro saved shots from Drašović and Vićković for a big victory for the coastal team and the surprise of the round.

Solaris dominant against Zvezda

A great Saturday of Croatian clubs was rounded off by Solaris from Sibenik. Sunčani beat Crvena zvezda in the middle of Belgrade, almost leaving them with no chance. The home team led briefly only at the beginning (2:1 and 3:2), but already at the end of the first quarter the scoreboard showed that the numbers prevailed on the side of the Croatian representative - 5:3 for Solaris.

Solaris kept the two-goal advantage and after the second quarter, and at one point in the third it was even +5 for Šibenik, i.e. 10:5. In the last eight minutes, Solaris entered with a still very nice advantage, 10:6.
In the last eight minutes, the host played the expected pressing in defense, increased the intensity of swimming and aggressiveness, reduced it to a minimum with a little less than two minutes to go, for them the backlog, 10:11. However, the people of Šibenik managed to keep that advantage until the end, and took home the first three points of the season.