The Croatian Handball Premier League () is the highest men's
handball
Handball (also known as team handball, European handball, Olympic handball or indoor handball) is a team sport in which two teams of seven players each (six outcourt players and a goalkeeper) pass a ball using their hands with the aim of thr ...
league in
Croatia
Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a country in Central Europe, Central and Southeast Europe, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. It borders Slovenia to the northwest, Hungary to the northeast, Serbia to the east, Bosnia and Herze ...
. It is organized by the
Croatian Handball Federation (''Hrvatski rukometni savez''). The league comprises 16 teams.
The league was formed in 1991 with the dissolution of the Yugoslav leagues.
Format
In the first phase, eight teams from two groups compete in a home-and-away round-robin series. All teams advance from the regular season to one of two postseason stages, depending on their league position. The top four teams from the regular season play in the Championship Round, while the bottom four teams play in the Relegation Round. At the end of the season, the bottom finisher is automatically relegated to the second league.
Current teams
Teams for season 2024–25
Past champions
*
1992
1992 was designated as International Space Year by the United Nations.
Events January
* January 1 – Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt replaces Javier Pérez de Cuéllar of Peru as United Nations Secretary-General.
* January 6
** The Republ ...
:
Zagreb Loto
*
1993
The United Nations General Assembly, General Assembly of the United Nations designated 1993 as:
* International Year for the World's Indigenous People
The year 1993 in the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands had only 364 days, since its ...
: Badel 1862 Zagreb
(2)
*
1994
The year 1994 was designated as the " International Year of the Family" and the "International Year of Sport and the Olympic Ideal" by the United Nations.
In the Line Islands and Phoenix Islands of Kiribati, 1994 had only 364 days, omitti ...
: Badel 1862 Zagreb
(3)
*
1995
1995 was designated as:
* United Nations Year for Tolerance
* World Year of Peoples' Commemoration of the Victims of the Second World War
This was the first year that the Internet was entirely privatized, with the United States government ...
: Badel 1862 Zagreb
(4)
*
1996
1996 was designated as:
* International Year for the Eradication of Poverty
Events January
* January 8 – A Zairean cargo plane crashes into a crowded market in the center of the capital city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...
: Croatia banka Zagreb
(5)
*
1997
Events January
* January 1 – The Emergency Alert System is introduced in the United States.
* January 11 – Turkey threatens Cyprus on account of a deal to buy Russian S-300 missiles, prompting the Cypriot Missile Crisis.
* January 1 ...
: Badel 1862 Zagreb
(6)
*
1998
1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''.
Events January
* January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for Lunar water, frozen water, in soil i ...
: Badel 1862 Zagreb
(7)
*
1999
1999 was designated as the International Year of Older Persons.
Events January
* January 1 – The euro currency is established and the European Central Bank assumes its full powers.
* January 3 – The Mars Polar Lander is launc ...
: Badel 1862 Zagreb
(8)
*
2000
2000 was designated as the International Year for the Culture of Peace and the World Mathematics, Mathematical Year.
Popular culture holds the year 2000 as the first year of the 21st century and the 3rd millennium, because of a tende ...
: Badel 1862 Zagreb
(9)
*
2001
The year's most prominent event was the September 11 attacks against the United States by al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror. The United States led a Participan ...
: RK Zagreb
(10)
*
2002
The effects of the September 11 attacks of the previous year had a significant impact on the affairs of 2002. The war on terror was a major political focus. Without settled international law, several nations engaged in anti-terror operation ...
: RK Zagreb
(11)
*
2003
2003 was designated by the United Nations as the International Year of Fresh water, Freshwater.
In 2003, a Multi-National Force – Iraq, United States-led coalition 2003 invasion of Iraq, invaded Iraq, starting the Iraq War.
Demographic ...
: RK Zagreb
(12)
*
2004
2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and Its Abolition (by UNESCO).
Events January
* January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 60 ...
: RK Zagreb
(13)
*
2005
2005 was designated as the International Year for Sport and Physical Education and the International Year of Microcredit. The beginning of 2005 also marked the end of the International Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples, Internationa ...
: RK Zagreb
(14)
*
2006
2006 was designated as the International Year of Deserts and Desertification.
Events
January
* January 1– 4 – Russia temporarily cuts shipment of natural gas to Ukraine during a price dispute.
* January 12 – A stampede during t ...
: RK Zagreb
(15)
*
2007
2007 was designated as the International Heliophysical Year and the International Polar Year.
Events
January
* January 1
**Bulgaria and Romania 2007 enlargement of the European Union, join the European Union, while Slovenia joins the Eur ...
: RK CO Zagreb
(16)
*
2008
2008 was designated as:
*International Year of Languages
*International Year of Planet Earth
*International Year of the Potato
*International Year of Sanitation
The Great Recession, a worldwide recession which began in 2007, continued throu ...
: RK CO Zagreb
(17)
*
2009
2009 was designated as the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei's first known astronomical studies with a telescope and the publication of Astronomia Nova by Joha ...
: RK CO Zagreb
(18)
*
2010
The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...
: RK CO Zagreb
(19)
*
2011
The year marked the start of a Arab Spring, series of protests and revolutions throughout the Arab world advocating for democracy, reform, and economic recovery, later leading to the depositions of world leaders in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen ...
: RK CO Zagreb
(20)
*
2012
2012 was designated as:
*International Year of Cooperatives
*International Year of Sustainable Energy for All
Events January
*January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins.
* January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...
: RK CO Zagreb
(21)
* 2013 : RK Zagreb
(22)
* 2014 : RK Zagreb
(23)
* 2015 : RK PPD Zagreb
(24)
* 2016 : RK PPD Zagreb
(25)
*
2017
2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly.
Events January
* January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...
: RK PPD Zagreb
(26)
* 2018 : RK PPD Zagreb
(27)
* 2019 : RK PPD Zagreb
(28)
* 2020 : Voided due to the
coronavirus pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
* 2021 : RK PPD Zagreb
(29)
*
2022
The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...
: RK PPD Zagreb
(30)
* 2023 : RK PPD Zagreb
(31)
* 2024 : RK PPD Zagreb
(32)
*won by the green table
EHF coefficients
The following data indicates
Croatian coefficient rankings between European handball leagues.
;Country ranking:
EHF League Ranking for 2018/19 season:
*6. (''6'')
Danish Handball League
The Herreligaen (men's league), formerly known as Herrehåndboldligaen (men's handball league), is the men's top Danish professional handball league. The winners of the Herreligaen are recognised as the Danish men's handball champions. The curr ...
(63.33)
*7. (''8'')
Macedonian Handball Super League (51.22)
*8. (''9'') Croatian Handball Premier League (42.25)
*9. (''10'')
Portuguese Handball First Division (37.33)
*10. (''7'')
Slovenian First League (men's handball)
The Slovenian First League of Handball (), currently named Liga NLB due to sponsorship reasons, is the top handball league in Slovenia. It is organized by the Handball Federation of Slovenia (''Rokometna zveza Slovenije''). The league comprises ...
(36.67)
;Club ranking:
EHF Club Ranking as of 3 March 2019:
* 13.
Zagreb
Zagreb ( ) is the capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Croatia#List of cities and towns, largest city of Croatia. It is in the Northern Croatia, north of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the ...
(523)
* 42.
Nexe Našice (223)
* 105.
Varaždin
Varaždin ( or ; , also known by #Name, alternative names) is a city in Northern Croatia, north-east of Zagreb. The total population is 46,946, with 38,839 in the city settlement itself (2011).
The city is best known for its baroque buildings, ...
(66)
* 115.
Dubrava (61)
* 162.
Poreč
Poreč (; known also by several alternative names) is a town and municipality on the western coast of the Istrian peninsula, in Istria County, west Croatia. Its major landmark is the 6th-century Euphrasian Basilica, which was designated a UN ...
(37)
See also
*
Croatian First League (women's handball)
The Croatian Women's First Handball League () is the top women's handball league in Croatia. It is organized by the Croatian Handball Federation. The league comprises fourteen teams.
Current teams
''As of 2024–25 season''
* ''Bjelovar'' - ...
*
Yugoslav Handball Championship
The Yugoslav Handball Championship was the highest level competition in men's team handball in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, played regularly for almost four decades between 1953 and 1992, before being abandoned due to the breakup ...
References
External links
Croatian Handball Federation
{{EHF leagues
Premier Handball League
Croatia
Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a country in Central Europe, Central and Southeast Europe, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. It borders Slovenia to the northwest, Hungary to the northeast, Serbia to the east, Bosnia and Herze ...
Professional sports leagues in Croatia