A lot of changes in the team, much work for coach Evgeni Trefilov: after the Olympics in Beijing, where the world champions finished second, Russia will start with a completely different team at the EURO 2008 in FYR Macedonia.Seven players end their international career after years of success.
Line player Oxana Romenskaya and left back Anna Kareeva (Zvezda stars) retire from handball. The club plans to bid farewell to them at the EHF Champions Trophy in Zvenigorod at the end of September.
Playmaker Irnia Poltoratskaya will not play for the national team anymore, Zvezda still hope to persuade her to continue on a club level.
All the three players won the World championship three times (in 2001, 2005 and 2007) and they were silver medallist in Beijing and at the EURO 2006 in Sweden. They won many Russian domestic titles and the Champions League in 2008. Poltoratskaya also won the CL with Slagelse twice.
Trefilov will also miss Natalia Shipilova, Ekaterina Andryushina (both Zvezda players), Maria Sidorova and Ekaterina Marennikova (from Lada).
Time will tell whether their goodbye would be definitive. Sidorova and Marennikova have private reasons to quit the national team, Shipilova and Andryushina have to be operated – and they will play for Zvezda after recovering.
Now Trefilov has to build a completely new team as he predicted after the lost final in Beijing:
“We will not be the favourites in FYR Macedonia as our team will look quite different.”
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