GROUP D
TAUGRES Spain
Maccabi Tel Aviv, Israel
ORTHESIS France
LOTTOMATICA Italy
It is unlikely that a couple of giants, who will certainly make it to the “Final Four” in recent years, will give someone the right to play in the playoffs. Especially convincing looks “Taugres”, whose home winning streak taking into account the last season is already 25 matches. The Basconians, who lost due to an injury to Zoran Planinic, strengthened the position of a playmaker by the talented Turk Ender Arslan. By the way, during the second stage, one of the leaders will have to upset his native audience - “Maccabi” also does not lose at his home site for more than a year. The Spaniards and Israelis will collide in the first round, without the participation of the Tau coach Velimir Perasovich, who was crushed by a sore throat.
However, the statement on the unconditional favorite of the above-mentioned clubs is to be challenged by “Lottomatika”, which was strengthened on the eve of the Top 16 by two well-known players - the Italian “compilation” Roberto Chiachig and the famous Russians for their performances in the Dynamo St. Petersburg Icelander Jon Stefansson.
GROUP E
CSKA Russia
OLYMPIAKOS Greece
HOWENTUD Spain
PARTISAN Serbia
Russian clubs exchanged well-known rival coaches. Now CSKA has the turn to upset Pini Gershon, the head of Olympiacos, and Dynamo got offended by the army team David Blatt.
Red-blue will be more difficult than white-blue countrymen. In Piraeus, they are looking forward to the return of the attacking machine Arvydas Matsyauskas, and even the front line was strengthened by ex-Perm Sam Hoskin. In response, CSKA made the rarest trade in Europe, exchanging the experienced Venezuelan Oscar Torres from Khimki.
“Partizan” scares rivals with the possibility of holding home matches in the Belgrade “Arena”, accommodating 19,000 spectators, and with a powerful figure of Predrag Drobnyak, and “Hoventud” will appreciate the demonstration of the skill of the reactive 16-year-old Ricky Rubio, who became the leader of the regular Euroleague championship in interceptions (3.45 ) in 18 minutes on average per game! By the way, the Russians should have a grudge against Rubio, who upset the cadet team in the final of last year’s continent championship.
GROUP F
PANATINAIKOS Greece
Barcelona, Spain
EPHES PILSEN Turkey
SOPOT Poland
Who doesn’t even need to think about reinforcements is Panathinaikos. Its composition is staffed by 15 approximately equally equal players, which allowed Zhelko Obradovic to test a huge number of tactical options and preserve the strength of the leaders (if you can distinguish those among the “green” ones). Quite a bit behind in personnel matters, “Barcelona”, preparing to return to the parquet healed Mario Kasuna. In the ranks of the Catalans, according to the official site of the Euroleague, only two did not smell the gunpowder of the “Final Four”. This is the Spanish child prodigy Fran Vazquez and who left the summer Orlando Kasun. “Ephesus” boasts neat defenders and strict Marcus Hayslip, who leads the block shots tournament, but is unlikely to reach the grandees. About "Sopot" here and there is no question.
GROUP G
Dynamo Moscow, Russia
BENETTON Italy
UNIQUA Spain
ARIS Greece
Having solved the main task for the season, Dynamo can now play at their pleasure. Moreover, the group they came across is not that the most difficult - rather, the most interesting. There are no real monsters here, but to compete with David Blatt’s Benetton, Unicaja, which demonstrated tremendous survivability at the finish of the regular season, with Aris, who lost only to CSKA at home, and even 3 points in overtime will be very interesting . Especially given the loss of Travis Hansen and the need to include rookie teams Takuan Dean into the game.
Nikolai TSYNKEVICH