It seems that there is nothing behind this match. It doesn’t threaten a departure from somewhere, doesn’t loom somewhere, doesn’t sparkle a trophy at the judges ’table, and does not freeze champagne in refrigerators. But the clash of great names, unmet ambitions and, in the end, just a couple of favorites, gathered almost full stands under the arches of USK CSKA. To the "Barcelona" standard did not reach a bit.
The nerve of the Moscow confrontation trembled for a long time in the actions of the participants. He did not pass, perhaps, only to Travis Hansen, a beginner in Russian reality. The American scored the first five points in the match, first deftly sticking the ball through the hands of the defenders in the aisle, then hitting from afar. The rest of the absurdity followed the absurdity. Lanky Alexei Savrasenko climbed under the “pot” from Antonis Fotsis, and Matyazha Smodis was covered by Lazaros Popadopoulos. The same Smodis made a funny run, popularly referred to as "jumping with the ball", Dmitry Domani barely caught a short pass from Fotsis, and J. Ar Holden threw twice from the front through Domani's hand - not even close.
Hansen’s memorable five points glowed lonely for a long time on the scoreboard. CSKA soaked the zeros only in the fifth minute, and the first ball from the game flew into the Dynamo ring exactly in the middle of the first period. With all the quality of the defensive actions of the guests (in a quarter the army team realized 3 out of 14 shots!), This did not allow them to go forward. Too confident actions of the hosts on the shields prevented. 15 rebounds of the final advantage of CSKA in this component - is not just made up of too many misses. On this day, the "big" army men were utterly stronger.
In fact, the superiority of the hosts in one of the key factors of any basketball game was predicted. Papadopoulos has not yet returned to optimal shape, and Focis has never been considered a major specialist in the game of defense. True, Dusan Ivkovich, on the question of whether he was thinking about how to confront the front line of CSKA, tritely stood up for his own wards: “Do you think Savrasenko, Smodis and Andersen are better than Dynamo? Yes, Papadopoulos is not quite ready yet. But Fotsis is acting perfectly on selection. The same can be said about Ekezi, Vasiliev, Domani, Monet. "
Controversial statement. There is no doubt another statement of Ivkovich: in the second quarter his team missed an advantage. CSKA acted on the well-established scenario: crushed the opponent with confidence and two simple aspects that could bring success even with a complete lack of luck - selection and defense. “I am very pleased with the way my guys worked one-on-one in defense,” said Ettore Messina. “I explain Popovich’s inaccuracy with Holden’s cool work,” Ivkovich didn’t think that his playmaker (2 of 12 hits from the game!) Went beyond the control powers.
As usual, the successful replacement Teo Papaloukas helped CSKA catch its own game, and there was no longer any doubt about the final result. The difference in the score incomprehensibly easily reached the “twenty”, and Ivkovich threw a white flag, in the fourth period, releasing four Russians to the site at once.
Nikolai TSYNKEVICH
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Above the ring
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