by Eurohoops Team / [email protected]
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In the 18th week of the EuroLeague, our representative Fenerbahçe Beko defeated its rival Barcelona in its home form and got its 11th victory in the league.
Our representative, Fenerbahçe head coach Saras Jasikevicius, stood in front of the microphone at the press conference held after the match.
Coach Jasikevicius’ statements at the press conference are as follows:
“Good evening everyone, I congratulate our players and fans for the win. After almost every match we talk about the character of our players, at this point we survive thanks to this character. Of course, we expect the new players to contribute more, we need more contribution from them. This is very obvious. Unfortunately, at this point of the season we cannot show a great game. However, that is not a problem, we are still in December. We survive thanks to the character of the boys and the fact that they know how to win games. Of course, the importance of knowing how to play the last moments is very, very big at these levels.
We are one of the best defensive teams in Europe. Today, we won with our defense, except for the last three minutes of the second quarter. As I said, defense is what’s keeping us going right now. We have to be honest, if we want to win right now, we can’t win by playing great basketball. We are not at a level where we can do this right now. We still don’t understand each other on offense, we don’t understand the system. We also have missing parts that we expect to be important parts. So it’s hard to play great that way. However, none of these are excuses, we need to win matches. You can also win matches like we did. This is the only way we can win right now. Of course, defense has a great place in our system. Right now, defense is like the foundation of our home. The foundation of the house is very good now, we will see if we can build something on this foundation.
Our fans are our strength. We have an incredible hall, our fans are always involved in the game. They love Fenerbahçe very much. Even though it was an important derby in football today, they filled the hall. Of course, we are in a basketball rivalry with Barcelona. It was unfortunate that the two matches coincided on the same day, but when Fenerbahçe is mentioned, one of the first things that comes to people’s mind is this incredible fan base.
This season is very difficult for everyone. Of course, we understand why the EuroLeague increases the number of games and teams, but we are destroying players this way. So something needs to be done about this. We cannot play five matches in nine days in Europe. This calendar affects the players’ performance during the season. The players are having a really hard time. Maybe we will survive this season, but we will see what happens next season. “I can say that it is very difficult to continue this way.”
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