Martinovic's Six Goals Lift Novi Beograd Past Strasbourg

The ball hit the back of Strasbourg’s net for the third time that evening off Vasilije Martinovic’s arm, and the stands at the pool in Oradea answered with the kind of applause usually reserved for the home side, even though Novi Beograd was the visiting team. The Romanian city hosted the first round of the Champions League qualifying tournament last night, and the Serbian champion opened it exactly the way it had promised before the trip: with a win.

Novi Beograd defeated France’s Strasbourg 15-12, with quarter scores of 2-1, 5-4, 5-4 and 3-3. The match stayed close for long stretches, with the French side converting more chances than a team of its ranking was expected to, but Novi Beograd broke the game open in the third quarter and at the start of the fourth. A run of four unanswered goals pushed the Serbian side ahead 14-9, and after that Strasbourg no longer had the legs to close the gap enough to threaten the result.

Martinovic did most of the damage, finishing the match with six goals and standing out as by far the most efficient player in the pool. Behind him, Nika Susiasvili, Viktor Urosevic and Nikola Kojic each added two goals, meaning five different players found the net, a sign that Novi Beograd did not travel to Oradea with a team that leans on a single man.

Coach Zoran Bajic had been clear about his expectations before the trip to Romania. “We expect to earn a spot in the Champions League,” Bajic said ahead of the tournament, and after the opening match that line sounds like a sober plan rather than a slogan for the cameras. The format in Oradea is simple: the top two teams in the group advance to the Champions League group stage, and Novi Beograd’s first-round win puts it on the better side of the table.

In the tournament’s other opening match, host Oradea faced Germany’s Spandau 04, so the group at this stage consists of those two clubs alongside the Novi Beograd and Strasbourg pairing. The schedule has the sides cross over in the next two rounds, which means Novi Beograd takes on Spandau today, Saturday, while Oradea plays Strasbourg in the same slot.

That match against Spandau carries a different weight than last night’s game. The German club, like Novi Beograd, came to Oradea aiming for one of the two spots that lead to the Champions League, so a loss today would be hard to make up even with a win in the third round. Novi Beograd enters that game as a team that has already shown it can compete at this level, but also aware that last night’s win only pays off if it holds up over the next two days.

What Novi Beograd showed against Strasbourg was a team that does not rely on one option. When Martinovic slowed down in the final quarter and Strasbourg tried to push back through its best players, it was the ones rarely mentioned first, Susiasvili, Urosevic and Kojic, who shut the door with their own goals before a comeback could even take shape. That is the difference between a team that dreams about the Champions League and one that is realistically fighting for it.

The next test comes fast. If Novi Beograd beats Spandau today, a spot in the group stage of Europe’s top club competition will be close to a formality heading into the final round. If not, the whole story from Oradea will come down to the last match and results elsewhere, a scenario no team chooses for itself.