Vardar host Nantes tonight without three players, and the first points are all that matters

Macedonian champions Vardar 1961 host France's Nantes tonight from 18:45 at the Jane Sandanski arena in the second round of the Champions League. Vardar returned to the elite competition with a 33:31 defeat away to Bundesliga side Melsungen - a match that stayed open to the end, with Vukasin Vorkapic on nine goals. Nantes won their first round 26:25 against Wisla Plock with a penalty in the final second. Coach Ivan Cupic confirmed that tonight he will be without Lazarevski, who has had a shoulder problem for some time and trains apart from the team, nor Bomastar, who felt pain in his back again in training. Pedro is in the final stage of recovery and the decision falls after the last session - if he is at fifty percent, there will be no risk taken. "We want to feel the real connection with our hall," Cupic said. The two clubs last met in the 2017/18 season, when Vardar were defending the European title and Nantes reached the final - each won their home leg. Eight years and one complete rebuild of the club separate that generation from this one. Tonight, two hours before the match, there will be a fan zone outside the hall with a music programme dedicated to Macedonian music, marking 35 years of independence. The atmosphere is there. The points are not yet.

The Macedonia Trophy returns to Ohrid: Serbia, Montenegro and Croatia in three days

The Handball Federation of Macedonia has published all the details of the Macedonia Trophy: the host is again Ohrid, at the Biljanini Izvori hall, and the tournament runs from 24 to 26 September. The women's national team opens against Serbia, plays Montenegro on the second day and Croatia on the last. Three matches, three neighbours, and not one of them easy - which is, in fact, the point. It is also the first real look at new head coach Igor Markovic within the EHF week. A tournament with well-chosen opponents is worth more than ten friendlies against anybody. The question the people of Ohrid will take home after three evenings is whether this squad has a team or only a fixture list.

Montpellier host Barcelona: 14 meetings, nine wins for the Catalans

The second round of the men's Champions League brings the match of the week - Montpellier against holders Barcelona, on Thursday from 20:45. The French club is deliberately leaving its regular 3,000-capacity hall and moving to the Sud de France Arena in front of 8,900 people - the same venue where it has already hosted this same opponent three times in the past decade. The two clubs have met 14 times in European competition: Barcelona lead with nine wins, Montpellier have four, and the first meeting in November 2000 ended in a draw. But Montpellier won the most recent duel - away, at that, 37:34, after trailing 18:19 at half-time. Since then Montpellier spent two seasons in the EHF European League, so the two sides have no shared match in between. In group A the same week, Fuchse Berlin host Veszprem - the German club opened the season with the most emphatic win in its European Cup history, 44:33 in Belgrade against Partizan, with nine goals from Mathias Gidsel. Barcelona have nine wins from fourteen meetings. That is enough to be favourites, but not enough to be a guarantee - as anyone who follows this league already knows.

The EHF European Cup with a record 38 teams, and Ohrid defending the title

The new season of the men's EHF European Cup began with a figure the third-tier European competition has never seen before: 38 teams from 21 countries in the first round, where the previous record was 30 teams in the 2021/22 season. A total of 83 sides have entered the race for the title - the 19 winners from the first round in October will meet the 45 that skip the opening. The reigning champions, HC Ohrid, begin their title defence in the second round. Which means the Macedonian club enters the fullest edition of the competition so far, as the team everyone else is chasing. Greece, Israel, Luxembourg, Turkey and Austria have three clubs each, more than any other country. When a competition grows this fast, last year's title does not become easier to defend - it becomes harder, because now even more teams want it.

Metz, Esbjerg and Odense win, Podravka fall in their 200th European match

The second round of the women's Champions League ended with three home wins. Holders Metz outplayed Gloria Bistrita and handed them their first defeat of the season, with goalkeeper Sabrina Novotna named player of the match with 17 saves and a goal of her own. Esbjerg beat Sola with seven goals each from Nora Mork and Henny Reistad, while for the Norwegians Camilla Herrem scored eight. Odense overcame Croatia's Podravka and recorded their first Champions League win since March 2026, ending a run of four matches without a victory. For Podravka it was their 200th match in the competition - an anniversary that did not go the way they wanted. The Croatian side kept it level for almost twenty minutes and even led, but then a nine-minute drought without a goal let the hosts run off a 7:0 spell. Katarina Pandza scored 11 goals for Podravka, which says everything about how much one player can carry and how much they cannot.