Ivkovic: We are going to be ready on Friday

Dusan Ivkovic spoke to the media about the Euroleague Final Four and the readiness level of his team.

Olympiacos BC organized a Media Day before its participation to an event where all the players were at the avail of the reporters. Before that, the Serbian coach expressed his thought on the great European rendezvous…

“Today the greatest week for the Euroleague begins, the Final Four week for the four teams. I believe that our team is going to be ready for the greatest competition of European basketball. The guys are here. The team is almost completely ready, with only Papadopoulos facing a small problem and not practicing in the last couple of days. Preparation was difficult, we haven’t had official games and that’s why we played two friendly games against Radincsky and Panionios” Duda commented.

Then, the “reds” coach referred to Barcelona: “We are now entering the final stretch in view of the Final Four and we have to focus on Barcelona, a very experienced team that we know very well. I’m happy with my team and I believe that we can play them. We have the potential. According to the schedule, we have done the best we could and the most important thing is that the team is in a very good shape which the biochemical tests prove; we are in a much better shape than in the same period last season. I believe we are going to be ready on Friday”.

Barcelona is experienced, we have energy. We have to pay attention to different things, like controlling the tempo, while they are the best team in Europe in regard to the assists/turnovers ratio (15 and 10 appr.) They are the best defensive team receiving an average of 62 points and have two very experienced and good players, Lorbek and Navarro. They have two different type point guards, Huertas and Sada, the first one creates and the second one is more of an organizer, and at the “2” position they have Eidson, who had been injured, behind Navarro. They have three left handed players, Pete Michael who is very experienced, the Australian Ingles, and a very experienced front line, all different type players, with Lorbek as their leader, who plays a very strong game inside and out of the basket. With such a team like Barcelona in a set game, we are not going to have many options, the guys are going to try and play at a very high tempo and of course we are here, at the Final Four, which nobody had expected from us”.

Dusan Ivkovic sent his own message to the Olympiacos fans: “When we are talking about a team, everything changes. I returned after 15 years, but the Olympiacos fans remain the best. They are going to support us in Istanbul a lot, just like they did in Rome and I’m certain they are going to help us a lot”.