Waspo under pressure

This Tuesday, we will once again take a look at the water polo Champions League. This sport has been somewhat under the radar in Germany in recent years because the national team has not been successful and the clubs can rarely keep up at the international level. In our Steaua Bucharest vs. Waspo Hannover tip, we will check whether the German champions will be successful in Romania.

The starting signal for the current premier class fell last week. The first two teams in each of the four groups will advance to the second group phase. In this group A, the starting position is very clear. The Serbs from Novi Beograd are the clear favorites and should advance as group winners. The other three clubs should therefore argue about who will accompany last year’s finalist to the intermediate round.

Novi Belgrade leads the table with three points after beating Steaua Bucharest. Behind them is the second Romanian club, CSM Oradea, which beat Hannover in the away game in Magdeburg last week. The Romanian champions from Bucharest are considered to be even stronger than Oradea. In addition, the team from Lower Saxony has to play away on Tuesday.

Therefore, the forecast for the clash between Steaua Bucharest and Waspo Hannover can only be a home win. We even tend to expect a reasonably clear victory for the Romanians. Currently, the odds for a home win are around 1.30.

Steaua Bucharest – Statistics & current form

While Steaua Bucharest football club had to change its name by court order after being sold to an investor in 2017 and is now known internationally as FCSB, the Romanian champions continue to play under the name Steaua Bucharest. This name comes from the club’s connection to the Romanian Ministry of Defense. This club is therefore still nicknamed the Militarii.

Steaua Bucharest have won the Romanian championship eight times in a row

Let’s turn to the sport of water polo. Steaua have dominated this sport in Romania since 2015. They have now won eight championships in a row. It could have been one more, but no championship was played in 2019/20 due to the pandemic. Again, Steaua Bucharest is to be considered significantly stronger than CSM Oradea in the national comparison.

One of the main reasons for the Romanian champions’ success is coach Bogdan Rath, who in his playing days first represented the Romanian national team and later the Italian team at the Olympic Games. Large parts of his squad at Steaua Bucharest have also celebrated great success with the Romanian team this year and have at least shown themselves to be among the world’s best.

Nationally, the only goal can be to defend the title. Internationally, the team is aiming to reach the top eight in the premier class again this year, after being relegated from the Champions League last year and reaching the quarter-finals in the Euro Cup. The Romanians lost the opening game in Belgrade 7:11, but now come the tasks that seem solvable and therefore we think that between Steaua Bucharest and Waspo Hannover a bet on a small handicap victory for the home side could be a good idea.

Provisional line-up of Steaua Bucharest:

Tic, Dragusin – Vuskovic, Georgescu, Fulea, Bota, Neamtu, Zivkovic, Dinca, Colodrovschi, Ganta, Iudean, Tepelus – Coach: Rath

Waspo Hannover – Statistics & current form

In recent years, German water polo has been in a clear decline. It is mainly due to the two top clubs Spandau 04 Berlin and Waspo Hannover to avert the free fall. Not only the clubs would benefit from the development of talents, but also the national team. However, there is currently a lack of quality to be able to play a good role in international competition.

Bad experiences with Romanians this season

The same applies to the German champions, who are directly seeded for the group stage of the Champions League. As recently as last week, one might have assumed that they would be able to beat the two Romanian clubs. However, the 10:11 home defeat against CSM Oradea was a significant setback. The intermediate round is now a distant prospect unless an away win is achieved in Bucharest on Tuesday.

However, we do not necessarily expect this and maintain that the forecast for the match between Steaua Bucharest and Waspo Hannover must be a relatively comfortable home win. The team from Lower Saxony has only played four competitive games this season, and it is clear that they have lost to strong opponents while clearly outclassing the underdogs.

The team of Aleksandar Radovic cannot be satisfied with 2-2 wins. Before the start of the season, the team from Hannover lost the Super Cup to their arch-rivals from Spandau. Added to that is the home defeat against Oradea. In the Bundesliga, however, there were clear victories against Ludwigsburg and ASC Duisburg. As a result, Waspo has had a mixed bag of wins and losses. Following the law of averages, they would have to face a defeat on Tuesday.

Provisional line-up of Waspo Hannover:

Götz, Benke – Macan, Schipper, Langiewicz, Küppers, Strelezkij, Lozina, Buha, Sekulic, Milardovic, Benic, Gansen – Coach: Radovic

Steaua Bucharest – Waspo Hannover Head-to-head / H2H record

Steaua Bucharest and Waspo Hannover have only played each other four times to date. In 2014/15, both teams played each other in the quarter-finals of the Euro Cup and in 2021/22 there were two duels in the Champions League. In the direct comparison, the reigning German champions are ahead with 2-1 wins. Once they drew.

At the end of 2014, the club from Lower Saxony lost to the Romanians in the Euro Cup. Two years ago in the premier class, however, there were two narrow victories for Waspo. In the Romanian capital, a 10-9 away win was enough. In the stadium pool in Hanover, a 13-12 victory was enough. On Tuesday, we expect that maybe just under 20 goals will be scored.

Steaua Bucharest – Waspo Hannover betting tip

Basically, Waspo Hannover has everything to play for in the Champions League on Tuesday. After the poor start at home against the Romanian runners-up, they now need to win away at the Romanian champions. It doesn’t really sound as if the German champions are likely to win.

However, Steaua also started with a defeat in the premier class. Last year’s finalist in Belgrade, however, was a super tough task. It couldn’t be much more complicated in European club water polo. All in all, we continue to place a bet on a home win in the Bwin app before the duel between Steaua Bucharest and Waspo Hannover.

However, we believe that there will not be an excessive number of goals. We would not consider a bet on fewer than 22.5 goals to be unrealistic. However, the majority of these goals should probably be scored by the Romanian hosts. That’s why we decided to offer odds on a handicap victory (-2.5 goals) for the Romanians between Steaua Bucharest and Waspo Hannover.