Bartzokas: «We need to focus on Vildoza and Nedovic»
Olympiacos will be hosting Red Star tomorrow (22/12, 20.00 CET) for the 15th round of the Euroleague.
“We coaches use this as motivation towards the following game”, was what the ‘red & whites’ coach, Giorgos Bartzokas said in regard to the loss against Villeurbanne in France. And he went on with the following: “This as a premise where we can push the players not to repeat the same mistakes. It remains to be seen if we have succeeded with that and if we are going to be focused in tomorrow’s game that is really difficult. We don’t know if the fans can sincerely comprehend how difficult this is. If you take a look at Red Star’s results in the last one month and a half, you will understand what I’m talking about. Right now, Vildoza and Nedovic, who hadn’t been playing during Red Star’s bad stretch, are scoring and facilitate about 60% of their team’s points. In about the 25 minutes they average, they also average 14 points each. We have to defend really well against them, if we want to win”.
Asked if he also has in the back of his mind the game against Panathinaikos on December 30, he replied: “We are not thinking about the game against Panathinaikos, because if we do that, we are going to lose the game against Red Star. We have to focus on tomorrow’s game, because it’s a very dangerous one, just like any other Euroleague game of course. And I don’t need to be the one saying that, it is proven week by week by the results. Real lost to Zalgiris, Efes lost their last two games, Fener lost three games in a row, so I don’t need to be saying that should you not focus on the game ahead of you, you are going to be paying the price. So, we cannot be thinking about the game against Panathinaikos”.
When asked to comment on the numbers that show that Olympiacos’ defense is not what it should have been during the last quarters of the games, he stressed: “You are talking about the games we lost. The games we lost are five and the ones we have won are nine. In the nine winning games that was not the case. Reporters and fans use to focus on the games lost and it’s fine they do that. We also analyze them and think about them, about what it is we can do better. However, what I want to tell you is that Olympiacos has been imposing his game. Some games we finish well, nine of them that is and five of them we didn’t. I don’t think that anyone expects, if we take a realistic view of the competition, that we are going to be the ones to win all the games we play. If someone thinks that, then they are really hard core Olympiacos’ fans and I can accept that. We certainly try to get better, to have a better approach to the games, better decision making, both the coaches and the players. We want to improve, to learn from our mistakes. However, we cannot duel on the games that we did not manage to close for us while we were leading. We need to understand that the other teams also participate the game and they play and they have talent. Also, we can’t be playing at the same level for forty minutes. We are certainly going to try to do so, but we are not there yet”.
Finally, in regard to the health of Giannoulis Larentzakis and Moustapha Fall who were down with viral infections, he said: “Larentzakis is fine and is going to be playing tomorrow, Fall went through 1/3 of the practice session today and is really beat down by the virus. We’ll see how strong he feels, so he can play tomorrow if needed”.