"A great coach is one who has great players." This is my favorite thesis about our work, announced many years ago by Azo Nikolic, the father of Yugoslav basketball and my teacher, even if in absentia. These words fascinate me with their simplicity and accuracy. During my work in basketball, I also met other characteristics of success, some the size of a book. But they always have a lot of superfluous, optional, secondary. These words of Nikolic are actually not only shorter, but also fuller than all of them.
Trust is one of the most important words in my dictionary. If the coach does not trust the players, then he does not trust himself. After all, it was the coach who chose them.
None of my teams had a list of prescriptions, any printouts with rules of conduct. Discipline is a necessary part of our common success, but it must be self-discipline. Firstly, I value too much the individual responsibility of the players, on the site and beyond, and if there is no such responsibility, we just leave. Secondly, when a coach turns into an overseer and tries to keep track of everything that players do outside of basketball, they begin to act against his orders as soon as he turns away. This is how a person works. This is psychology. And I understand something in it.
Psychology is not only an important part of my work, but also my long-standing passion. Even before I began to train at a high level, I liked to read some books on this subject. And during my work with the Italian national team, the Olympic Committee invited me to work with a group of psychologists at this organization. It turned out to be incredibly informative. Even when I left the team, I continued to work with this group of psychologists at a private level. Now I sometimes give lectures on psychology and human resources at the departments of economics at the universities of Bologna and Milan. More precisely, I read it before moving to Moscow - now there is no time left.
When asked about the role of psychology in basketball, I always answer the question with the question: do you notice from the rostrum when some team controls their emotions well, and some don't matter? No one has answered no.
I believe in the power of simple things. In particular, due to such a simple thing as the speed of the ball in attack. The more the ball moves, the more prerequisites the team has to find a good position for the prepared shot. Of course, sometimes the ball just does not fly into the ring, and that’s it. This happens. But if you did not twitch, show patience, keep the ball moving in the attack - everything will work out. So it has been a million times and a million times will be.
The movement of the ball in the attack is also important for the reliability of the defense. If one of the players does not get the ball in front, he will simply lose concentration during defensive actions. This is especially true for the center: you will not force any of them to defend themselves if he has not received the ball ahead of him for several minutes. I'm not even talking about the shots - let them make two or three snipers, since they are much better than the others in this component. I am talking about the movement of the ball, about the involvement of the whole team in the attack.
Fear of defeat is one of the conditions for victory. I know that for sure. All feelings in this situation are aggravated, all organs work 100%. True, this fear should not be too much, otherwise it does not tonic, but paralyzes.
Do not think that experienced players or coaches have no such fear. On the contrary: when you have achieved a lot, you are afraid to fall below your level. I think Mohammed Ali, in the prime of his career, was afraid to miss the straight into the jaw more than at the beginning. Because in the beginning he had nothing to lose. I still have this fear of losing. Sometimes I even feel it physically. You know when your breathing is a little lost or your stomach is dropping. And this is very good.
Self-control , the ability to keep your head cold is a very strange thing. In coaching, I have this property appeared. Either I developed it on my own, or it came with age - I don’t even know. I hardly lose my temper during important matches, I watch them as if on TV. But here's what is surprising: in all other respects, I didn’t have it either. Playing basketball, I did not get along well with my nerves. The same thing happens now when I play tennis. Every week we go to court with Yuri Yurkov, manager of CSKA. We are more or less the same level. But if I do not take a set with a margin of several points, if we enter the tie-break, I lose.
In the so-called “simple” games, I’m a weaker coach than in top games. This is not self-criticism, I can explain. In such matches, I become less tolerant of team mistakes, more often infuriated and, accordingly, lose concentration. Therefore, I see less, analyze worse and work in such matches a little weaker. That’s why I don’t like “simple” games.
Being a coach a week before the “Final Four” or on the eve of other big tournaments is a real pleasure. The issue of motivating players is completely eliminated. The concentration of each, even some youth from the far end of the bench is 100%.
I reviewed the match against Maccabi in the Euroleague final three times. For the first time the night after the game, to make sure that we really won. For the second time in the summer, during my vacation, when I was thinking about whether to change something in the staff of CSKA. The third time - on the eve of our September meeting at the tournament in Cologne, to once again make out the opponent’s game.
If we lost to Maccabi in the finals, I would probably have reviewed this video about ten times.
From a technical point of view, it is easier to work with CSKA now, in my second season. I have a complete understanding with the players, the club staff, and we all know what methods to achieve success. But in fact, this season will be more difficult than the past. This is always the case with teams after great success, not only in basketball, but also in other sports too. Even if the team ultimately wins, it will push its way to this victory through great difficulties.
After victory, everything seems easier. And sometimes I see - not only in the players, but also in the club staff, even in myself - elements of complacency. It’s hard to fight, it’s a completely natural manifestation of human psychology. But this must be done if we want to win again.
I never tell the players to forget about previous successes. I do not say, because it is useless. Because I know: they still will not forget. I should not live an illusion. I have to proceed from reality and figure out what to do next.
Knowing the risk of complacency, after such victories you are always tempted to shake the composition. But CSKA and I decided not to do this. Firstly, this is a fairly young team, with growth potential. Secondly, I have twice rebuilt the composition of my teams after winning the Euroleague and this had no effect. In 1998 at Virtus, these changes were inevitable. Our cementing player Zoran Savic was lured to Turkey with a crazy contract, and we could not make up for the loss. In 2001, at Kinder, such a change occurred on my initiative, when I brought Bechirovich to the team, who immediately entered into an unhealthy competition with Yarich. The “chemistry” of the team was broken. I have no complaints about Yarich and Bechirovich, both good guys and talented players. It was my mistake - I collected too many young cocks in the water coop.
Only two coaches managed to win the Euroleague for two years in a row - Obradovic and Gershon. Obradovic’s achievement is unique - he won with different teams, and this success cannot be analyzed, it’s too much tied to Zeljko’s personality. I’m more interested in Gershon’s achievement, because it is comprehensible. And by understanding this, you can learn something.
I have excellent contacts in the coaching world, many friends and acquaintances. Dozens of people congratulated me on the victory in the last Euroleague - and did it sincerely. But I already know that people who come to you in the summer with congratulations and a smile will come up with a knife during the season.
For many teams, winning the Euroleague is a pipe dream. But such usually tend to beat the champion more than anyone else and, as it were, take the day in his place.
Last season, I found the right balance between supporting my players and putting pressure on them. Now we need to look for him again, and this should be a different balance.
For some reason, everyone believes that we, as the champions of the Euroleague, must now win all matches of this tournament with a difference of 25 points, and all matches of the championship of Russia - with a difference of 50. I wonder why, even if in the past, the championship season this was not! We won only when we were completely focused. And when not - in Malaga, in Kazan, and so on - we lost. CSKA is a kind of team, a bit like a bike that crashes if you don't pedal. We do not have so much class to win only on it. For victories, we always need a high level of readiness and concentration.
Despite maintaining the roster , I want to make CSKA's game a little different. Tighten the protection. Learn to play with two "big" at the same time - Savrasenko and Andersen. To enter into the game Ponkrashova, who, like all young talents, is unstable. And we just have to learn how to play without Smodis, because CSKA with and without Smodis are two different teams. The point is not only in his points and rebounds. He is the best of our “big” in gears, and he connects the front line with the back. Previously, Panov could replace him in this, but now there is nobody.
I’ve probably already been asked a hundred times if CSKA Los Angeles Clippers would have beaten in America during the regular season or not. And most often people who were far from basketball asked. This question should have bothered me, but I like it. First of all, the fact that he sat in the minds of random, in general, people who usually do not suffer from questions about basketball. Matches such as Moscow with Clippers obviously make our game more popular.
In fact , if we played with the Clippers in the States during the NBA season, then our opponent would be a favorite. This is if you objectively look at things. On the other hand, Rick Barry, with whom I spoke during the NBA Live Tour, told me that in the Eastern Conference CSKA would fight for the playoffs. And he seems to have no need to flatter me.
Whenever you play with NBA teams, even if the people working there are smart and not arrogant, you feel their gaze down. This increases our desire to win. This increases our strength by twenty percent at least. And this once again indicates to me that it is impossible to look down upon rivals. Even if we have good reason.
While CSKA plays better than at the beginning of last season. But worse than at the finish. So if we want the same finish, we must add.
When I came to CSKA in the summer of 2005, I considered it important to take on such a thing as identifying roommates during our trips. He settled the legionnaires with the Russians, the young with the experienced, and the “small” with the “big”. It was only at the end of the season that he allowed the players to choose their roommates themselves, because by this period they began to understand each other much better. And because in this segment of the season, something else was more important - their inner comfort.
In words, this idea of mine — to help players better understand each other — was expressed as follows: “All Americans should try dumplings, all Russians should be hamburgers. Then you can say what you don't like. But I have to try. ”
This is an important rule - so that at least two Russians are always on the court in matches of the Russian Championship. And the right one. But sometimes it works against Russian basketball. Gives excessive comfort to local players and ultimately harms them. People may not be surrendered to basketball, not progress in it - and year after year they will receive very decent contracts. For a place on the site you have to fight. And only in this fight can you grow.
I am glad when they call me to conduct coaching seminars or ask me to conduct an open training. I readily give away the knowledge that I possess, because it is useful for basketball in general - and because someone also once helped me. Perhaps this has one more, subconscious explanation: when I give everything I know, I have to come up with something new.
I am often asked about the Russian mentality. About whether he interferes with my work. I don’t want to generalize, I generally rarely undertake generalizations. But those Russians that I met are dedicated players who are ready to follow the most stringent instructions and work on the site for 5-6 hours. But they have a little less than the Americans and Western Europeans, developed game looseness, the ability to talented impromptu, to non-standard moves. To deviate from the rules on your own responsibility. I don’t know, maybe this is somehow connected with the way of life of the country over the past hundred years or with attitudes in the education system. I repeat: I'm not ready for generalizations yet. But there is such a problem.
Russia is a world leader in athletic disciplines. This is clearly visible even in basketball. Watching your youth, I see a lot of incredibly fast basketball players. Or amazingly high jumping. Or basketball players, squeezing some fantastically heavy barbells. But the thing is that these qualities alone mean little if they are not demonstrated directly in basketball. And then the speed disappears somewhere when dribbling the ball, the power is lost in the contact game, and these unique jumps make these unique jumps a little out of place. The intensity, density of games is low - both in children and in adults. But this contact does not need to be afraid, it needs to be sought. There is no good basketball without him. Maybe that's why Russia is a little better at volleyball?
Actually, I'm just joking, volleyball has its own difficulties. And what my friend Caprara did with the Russian women's team is a huge deal. Interestingly, of all the foreign coaches in Russia, the Italians are doing better. Remember this t-shirt in Madonna’s clip - Italians do it better? I’m thinking, maybe Caprara and I will get these? But, of course, I'm joking again.
It’s very, very strange - with all my love of travel, I got my first foreign job when I was only 46 years old. Offers have always been - for example, a year earlier from Real Madrid. But somehow not on time, then professionally, but more often in life. Only now, my wife and I decided to leave our daughter, who is studying in Italy, considering her adult enough. And now I have four years to work outside of Italy, before my son will have to go to school.
Treviso , where I worked with Benetton, is a sleepy, cozy town. Bologna, where I spent the largest part of my career and where I have a home, is much larger, but it cannot be compared with Moscow. Speaking of the first sensation from Moscow, I will be honest: it scares. Not a premonition of something bad, but corny - the size, vanity, general madness. But my wife and I quickly got used to everything - in winter, in traffic jams, in a supermarket instead of small shops with bread and vegetables, where you are known by name. Laura even mastered the subway.
What is the hardest thing to get used to in Moscow ? I’ll probably surprise you: there are no places to look into for a moment, take coffee from the counter, have a word with the bartender, throw a couple of coins on the counter and run about your business. All the time you need to call devushka, wait for the menu and so on. This is a real trifle, in principle. But for us, Italians, this is somehow important.
In the second year of my life in Moscow, I moved from Krylatsky to the center, to Petrovka. Why? Because Dynamo moved to Krylatskoye. Well, this is a joke, of course, - just my wife and I wanted to have a nice street under the window for evening walks, a cafe where you could go down almost in slippers, and other joys of the life that we led in Bologna and Treviso. And we, in general, found them.
All the time I have difficulties when they ask me about Russia. Still, I live in Moscow, and not in Russia. If they say about New York that this is not America, then Moscow has approximately the same relation to Russia. This is a cosmopolitan metropolis in which amazing sociocultural processes take place. I am interested in watching them. But I understand that the Russians in Rostov are not like the Russians in Moscow. But I don’t know Russian from Rostov very well.
I don’t have time to study Russian with a teacher or at least from books, but the simple practice of memorizing words and some separate phrases gives results. The word is here, the word is here - and now you can quite explain yourself, at least in the restaurant or in the locker room with the players. Spanish, for example, I once learned that way. Although it is, of course, easier.
In fact, I understand Russian much better than many people think. Although I don’t know if I should admit it ahead of time.