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The defeats of Spain and Turkey, against Belgium and Georgia, respectively, on the third day of the Eurobasket have turned Group A of the tournament upside down. Belgium, Montenegro, Spain and Turkey are tied at two wins and one loss, while hosts Georgia have one win and two losses and Bulgaria have three losses to take them out of the round of 16. On Monday, Group A will have a rest day and everything will be decided on Tuesday and Wednesday. Spain will face Montenegro on Tuesday and Turkey on Wednesday.
That is as long as Turkey decides not to carry out the threat it announced after the loss to the hosts. Georgia beat the Ottomans after two overtimes (83-88) and in a game plagued by incidents. There were three disqualifying techniques, those of the Georgian Duda Sanadze and the Turkish Furkan Korkmaz, who were about to arrive on the track. And so as not to miss his continental curriculum Turkish coach Ergin Ataman was also expelled.
The most serious thing did not happen on the field, but it happened off it. According to the Turkish Federation, shortly after Korkmaz and Sanadze were expelled, the Ottoman player was attacked in the locker room tunnel by three Georgian players and several members of the pavilion’s security. The vice president of the Turkish federation and former player, Omer Onan, recounts the incident as follows, according to the “Eurohoops” website: “While Furkan Korkmaz was walking down the hall to the locker room with our coach, the Georgia players who were not in the minutes they attacked him together with the expelled player [Sanadze] and the police. At the end of the match, 30 policemen pushed us and we got into a fight with the Georgian police”. Onan assures that if FIBA does not provide these images, Turkey will withdraw from the competition.
But there’s more the Turkish team denounces that during the tangana of the two players on the track the clock kept ticking and that 22 seconds were lost that were not recovered later. “The fact that it is not just one or two seconds, but 22 makes us think that the situation is not just due to an error,” says Hakan Demir at a press conference. Demir is Ergin Ataman’s assistant and appeared because the coach refused to comment after all the incidents. Turkey is Spain’s rival on the last day of the first phase.
Controversy in the Germany-Lithuania
Georgia-Turkey was not the only conflictive game on the third day. Germany secured qualification for the round of 16 after defeating Lithuania 107-109 in a dramatic duel, with two extensions and which will also have an epilogue in dispatches as the Lithuanians have filed a protest due to an error by the referees. It turns out that in a situation where there had been a foul in favor of the Lithuanians was also called a technical foul against German coach Gordon Herbert. However, the referees forgot to make the third free throw shot effective. which corresponded to Lithuania. At the end of the 40 regulation minutes, the Lithuanians asked to make the throw effective, but the referees decided that it would be against the regulation.
