For a tournament in the Moscow suburbs, not burdened with the need right now to let anyone in the eye, spectators gathered in the stands a decent amount. Especially when you consider the difficult Monday and the start time of the first semifinal, which almost coincides with the end of the working day.
CSKA a la "Pao"
Dusan Ivkovich, undoubtedly, realizing that in the current state without a surprise they could not cope with the army, tried to surprise opponents. The reserve turned out to be the untouchable favorite of the head coach Popovich - he was replaced by the Russian “compilation” Bykov. The reason for the reshuffle became clear, as soon as Boyan appeared on the site. The Serbian defender did not have time to really enter the game, when he fired a desperate “three” with a deviation (he didn’t even reach the temple), and after a couple of minutes he got under Andersen’s “pot”.
CSKA, obviously, perfectly learned the lessons given by Panathinaikos. No, of course, the team of Ettore Messina this season twice managed to cope with the Dynamo Moscow. But the tactics used methodically by the Greeks helped here. The defenders of the army defiantly left a meter of distance between themselves and the attacking player, only indicating resistance during a long throw and carefully watching the aisles. In the first half, white-blue still hit a couple of times, and the rebounds on someone else’s shield won, but then luck ended. “We hit 4 out of 22 three-pointer. You cannot throw with such terrible accuracy, ”complained Dushan Ivkovich.
Unlike a Serbian colleague, who speaks good Russian, but prefers to communicate with journalists in English, Ettore Messina shocked the audience with a set of quite tolerable Russian phrases: “Surprised by my Russians?” The Italian hesitated only at the key phrase “hit percentage”, after which he continued in the more familiar English.
In the end, Messina was asked who he would prefer as an opponent in the finals. “You yourself know the answer,” the trainer suggested. “UNICS is the clear favorite in the next pair.”
Chikalkin aka Star
The coach of CSKA is easy to understand. Modern UNICS is the opposite of Dynamo Moscow, a well-equipped and dangerous team, with the most omnipotent set of “big ones” in Russian basketball.
True, the first quarter of the meeting with Dynamo near Moscow did not begin, when the most malevolent fans of the army began to rub their hands: grabbing their ankle with their feet, Dariush Lavrinovich was lying on the floor. The Lithuanian foot was gently removed from the sneaker and teips, wrapped in ice and laid on a pillow of towels. It seemed that the Cup for Dariush was over. In the best case, the Cup, God forbid, is not a season. What was the surprise of the fans when Lavrynovych was back on his feet, and in the middle of the fourth period he went to the site completely - when everything had already been decided.
“The doctor advised me, you know,” Antanas Sireika confirmed the bewilderment of the journalists. “I would not risk it, but our doctor believes that Dariush needed to gain some psychological confidence before the final.” It is necessary - it is necessary.
The teams generally had enough heroes. Take the same Padius, according to the acting the main thing at a club near Moscow that had not trained for two days. Nicholas sometimes gave out fantastic moments. Or Chikalkin, as if he remembered the best years of the Legendary sniper, who had trained us to watch him throw balls from difficult situations, and this time worked clearly. 8 out of 9 hits are unrealistic indicators. Everyone knows that UNICS is often far from reality. CSKA, of course, too.
Nikolai TSYNKEVICH, Prominent