Serbian national basketball team | Photo: FIBA
The Serbian men’s basketball team won the first match of the World Cup finals on Saturday, but the victory was overshadowed by the injury of one of the leaders, Filip Petrushev. Serbian basketball players defeated China in the B subgroup game in Manila with the result 105:63 (25:14, 30:20, 22:13, 28:16).
In the first half, Petrushev suffered an ankle injury, leaving the court after playing a total of five and a half minutes, during which he scored eight points. Bogdan Bogdanovic scored 14 points and grabbed four rebounds for the Serbians, Vanis Marinkovic had 14 points, and Dusan Ristic had 13 points and six rebounds. Zhui Zhao scored 17 points for the Chinese.
Before that, in this subgroup, Puerto Rico defeated South Sudan 101:96 (24:29, 18:23, 18:15, 21:14, 20:15) in overtime.
Tournament format
The 32 teams of the final tournament are divided into eight subgroups. The winners of the first two places in each group will continue the fight for the 1st-16th place, while the third and fourth place winners will fight for the 17th-32nd place.
Groups A, B, C and D compete in the Philippines, Groups E and F play in the Japanese city of Okinawa, and Groups G and H play in Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia. The top eight teams will compete for medals at the “SM Mall of Asia” arena in the port area of Manila.
In the final tournament of the World Cup, seven participants of the Paris Olympic Games tournament will be determined, as well as 19 other national teams, which, together with the winners of the five regional pre-qualification competitions, will fight for the last four tickets to the Olympic Games next summer.
Victory with an unpleasant aftertaste – Brazil loses one of the leaders in the opening PK
