Sagosen returns to "a very special place"

Four months ago, Sander Sagosen returned to where it all began. The Norwegian superstar was born in Trondheim; his first club was Kolstad before he moved to Haslum – and then went abroad in 2014. Nine years and many trophies and medals later, Sagosen (now 28) is back in his hometown, Kolstad. "I am sure everybody loves to go back to their hometown when they have been away for a long time - to their family and friends. This is why I returned to Trondheim and joined Kolstad," the prolific centre back states.

His father, who was one of his first coaches, is a goalkeeper coach at Kolstad; his family lives in Trondheim - and the family grew in July when Noah was born, the son of two famous handball players, Sander Sagosen and Hanna Bredal Oftedal, sister of former IHF World Player Stine Oftedal (Györ) and former professional in Norway and France.

"We feel comfortable at home despite all things which had happened around the club since our return," Sagosen mentions the financial problems of Kolstad. But now, everybody can focus on sports – in their first-ever season in the Machineseeker EHF Champions League. After a brilliant debut, winning at Bitola, two more victories followed - including the one against Sagosen's former club THW Kiel, with which he won the EHF Champions League in 2020. "On the one hand, it was great to see so many friends in a great atmosphere in our arena; on the other, it was a great feeling to beat Kiel," Sagosen looks back.

On Wednesday (18:45 CEST, live on EHFTV), an even more special match is ahead for the Norwegian international: for the MOTW, Kolstad will travel to Aalborg Håndbold. Kolstad are third-ranked in group A with six points, Aalborg is fifth with five points. In several aspects, Aalborg is a very special place for Sagosen: From 2014 until 2016, he played for the Danish club, where he became an international top star, and he finished his stay becoming Danish champions. "I love this club, playing in this great arena; I still know so many people there. It will be great to return," says Sagosen.

A second special memory is his first major tournament with the Norwegian national team – the preliminary round of the EHF EURO 2014 in Denmark. Nineteen-year-old Sagosen impressed all experts and fans – and already took on a lot of responsibility in the team, which, despite Sagosen's performance, failed after the first stage. In 2017 and 2019, Sagosen steered Norway to the World Championship finals; in 2020, he was the top scorer and bronze medallist at the EHF EURO, partly played in his hometown Trondheim.

"I have a special relationship to Aalborg and the arena, so I love to play there," says Sagosen – who will not only face his former club but three top stars with whom he had played in different clubs: his former Paris Saint-Germain teammates Mikkel Hansen and Hendrik Möllgaard as well as Niklas Landin, with whom he had played at THW Kiel. At both PSG (2017-2020) and THW (2020-2023) he won the domestic championships in his final season – and is one of the rare players with trophies in those three top leagues.

"I am still in contact with Mikkel and Hendrik, but as usual in professional sports, the number of text messages gets smaller the longer you are gone from the club. But of course, it was just four months ago when Niklas and I said farewell to Kiel. I have learned much from top players like Niklas, Mikkel, Nikola Karabatic, or Domagoj Duvnjak.

Mikkel's skills and experience boost every team and player in every match and training session. I am looking forward to meeting very good friends, but of course, the friendship will be interrupted for 60 minutes, which is about competition and points."

The MOTW Aalborg vs Kolstad is also special because of both clubs' development and concept in the last years: gathering the best players from your country to form a competitive team that aims to go even in the EHF Champions League. In 2021, Aalborg had made it to the EHF FINAL4 in Cologne and even to the final.

Kolstad are trying to walk in those footprints: "We like to become as big as Aalborg already is, we are trying to go the same way in Kolstad, and it makes us happy when we are already compared with them. And maybe our growth was faster than expected, but now we want to go all the way. Maybe in four, five or seven years we will be part of the EHF FINAL4 – and maybe we will face Aalborg in the final. But we need some time," says Sagosen. Except for current Champions League top scorer Sigvaldi Gudjonsson from Iceland, Kolstad have an all-Norwegian squad, while Aalborg only counts on Scandinavian players. "In some years, we also want to sign some international top stars," says Sagosen.

This is the future; the present is the 2023/24 group phase of the Champions League. "Even if we are ahead of Aalborg right now, this means nothing. The group phase is long, and it looks like every team can beat any team in our group. It is much too early to predict which teams qualify for the playoffs and which teams make it straight to the quarter-finals. To proceed from the group phase, we must constantly play on a top level," concluded the Norwegian.

Photos: Sascha Klahn (Kiel), Kolstad (Kolstad)