I hope this is the year of the second Champions League, the level is very high. Very few teams have repeated in recent years, a sign of the level of water polo”. Felipe Perrone (Rio de Janeiro, 1986) is right, probably the most experienced player in the water polo Champions League, with 12 editions behind him. In the last eight years, only one team, the almighty Pro Recco, has been able to reclaim the crown (2015, 2021, 2022). Hungarians, Croats, Greeks, Italians and Catalans have alternated on the throne... although for the latter, Atlètic Barceloneta, glory is already a bit far away: 2014, in the Picornell final.
Now, in Belgrade, the sailors team is conspiring to once again win the highest European club title. The first obstacle, the Jug Dubrovnik in the quarterfinals (3:30 p.m.), the duel that opens the table of the final eight.
During these last eight years (including 2020 suspended due to the pandemic, when they were launched), the Barcelona team has crashed its illusions against the European powers, Ferencvaros and Pro Recco. But this season is different.
“This year is the first time that we have finished first in the group stage. At least we have had stability all year that we hope to maintain in the final eight ”, Perrone comments to this newspaper. Atlètic Barceloneta has been, by far, the best of the 16 teams in the group stage: first of A, with 39 points, that is, 13 wins and a single defeat (at the Sant Sebastià pool, with Recco) .
What has changed in 2023 at Atlètic Barceloneta, a team that has always swept domestic competitions (18 Leagues in a row) and that failed at the crucial moment in Europe?
To begin with, from the bench, the second season of Croatian Elvis Fatovic (former Australia coach and former Jug coach), a new mentality is fostered. “With Chus Martín [the previous coach] we won the 2014 Champions League; each one has his characteristics, Elvis has a different mentality, he has given us that Balkan tension of the sport, a different way of experiencing water polo, more than a game, with more tension, more aggressiveness. This is reflected in the water with a level of more physical training and a higher mental demand. It is the Balkan school, the toughest in sport”, explains Perrone.
To continue, this Barceloneta is less lethal offensively, with the loss of Álvaro Granados (he went to Novi Beograd), but has been strengthened defensively with Fatovic. “Our strength is based on defense. We have lost Granados this year, who is the best attacker in the world right now, but in defense we have had one more point of concentration and collective play. And whenever we fail, Unai is there”, comments Perrone. Unai is Unai Aguirre (20), the sensational international goalkeeper, the architect of the team's successes (2022 world gold and European bronze two months later), chosen as the best European water polo player of 2022.
“For us, the best defense is, we have the best defense in the Champions League. It's key: to be successful you have to have a good defense", comments Fatovic, who rules out that his team is a favorite despite their exceptional group stage, in which they beat Recco at home -for the first time in history- and Olympiacos in both games.
“Surely we weren't favorites at the beginning of the season when the draw was made, because Recco and Olympiacos have a bigger budget; We are not going as favourites, but we know that we can play against everyone”, says the Croatian, who confessed that “I have never enjoyed working so much in my life as I do here”.
Part of the fault lies with Julián García, the president of Barceloneta, who does not travel to Belgrade as a precaution, after having suffered two strokes. “I really appreciate your effort, we had never been first in the group: that way the others will take us into account and we can aspire to everything that comes our way. I think you are on a fantastic path. If we don't win now, we'll come back another year, ”García said goodbye to his boys excitedly.
