Garovic and Agbaba Fight in Red Star vs Bor Handball
Both handball players got blue cards in the 36th minute, Bor confirms there were irregularities at the match, and the league has yet to comment.
The scoreboard in the Banjica hall read 19-16 for Red Star in the 36th minute, and a single hard challenge was enough to turn the match into something handball would rather not see. Sara Garovic, who wore the red-and-white shirt until last season and now plays for Bor, struck Jelena Agbaba, Red Star’s pivot. Agbaba hit back.
The other players stayed composed, which prevented a bigger incident. The referee pair, Marko Sekulic and Vladimir Jovandic from Pancevo, showed both players a blue card, and tportal reports that both were sent off for the rest of the match. A blue card means the case goes to the competent disciplinary bodies.
Who struck first and what happens to both players?
The sources agree on the sequence. After a hard challenge by Agbaba, Garovic struck first, and Agbaba responded. The two were teammates at Red Star last season, and Mozzart Sport recalls that both were in the Serbia squad at last year’s World Championship in Germany.
The penalty will be decided by ARKUS league director Vladimir Knezic. Mozzart Sport estimates that both will certainly miss at least one match, but there is no official decision yet. Red Star won the match 28-23 and still has no lost points after three rounds, while Bor lost for the first time this season.
What was heard from the referees’ dressing room?
The brawl on the court was not the only story of the evening. The specialist portal Rukometni Zurnal reported that at halftime, cries and the sound of things breaking were heard from the referees’ dressing room. According to the same source, an unidentified person entered the room and physically attacked Sekulic and Jovandic.
For now, this is unofficial information. It has not been established who the attacker might have been, how that person reached the referees’ area or what preceded the incident, and neither the Handball Federation nor the competent authorities have confirmed that any of it happened.
The silence around the incident is almost complete. The ARKUS league management has made no official statement. The league director’s assistant for refereeing, Slobodan Visekruna, declined to comment on the event, match delegate Jovan Popadic did not answer reporters’ questions, and Jovandic did not return calls.
The only person from a club who said anything was Bor coach Zoran Barbulovic, and he did so with the caveat that the clubs had received an instruction from the league to stay quiet until the league speaks:
“I can say that there were irregularities. But we received instructions from the league not to comment on what happened at the match until the league itself comes out and makes decisions. We have already held a Board meeting after returning to Bor, and we will hold another before leaving for the return leg of the EHF European Cup in Belgium against Sint-Truiden. However, we will address the public only after the match in Belgium is over.”
Barbulovic made the remarks to Sport klub. With that, the visiting club confirmed that there were irregularities at the match, but not what kind.
A question for the league leadership
Sport klub raises a question the league will have to answer: how could the match continue if the incidents are confirmed, when that would run against the league’s rules. The answer depends on what actually happened in the dressing room, and for now only a narrow circle of people knows that.
Bor says it will issue a public statement only after the return leg against Sint-Truiden in Belgium. Until then, two things remain open: director Knezic’s decision on suspensions for Garovic and Agbaba, and the league’s official explanation of what happened between the two halves.
