Comments about Greece at the Stankovic Cup

[hagakure]

Will anyone be watching the games? I am listening to the radio right now and there are some people who are commenting on the game.

From what I hear Fotsis was our best player, which is very good to hear. It sounds like Fotsis is really ready to become a leader.
Our defense was very good but not our shooting. The only player who was shooting well according to people who saw the game was Spanoulis.
Also Papadopoulos was not very effective and they didn't seem to understand why Giannakis continues to start Hatzivrettas (personally I think he does it because he has good chemistry with Diamantidis, but I can understand why the fans don't agree with him).
Anyone else who is watching the game?

[Marble]

We lost to France

I haven't watched the games,but from what I hear,we won the game vs Australia clearly because of our defense.Offensively we just did what was necessary..
However,on day 2 we lost to France (68-72) and it seems that our team can lose only if the opponent scores more than 65-70 points..Anyway,we had to lose sometime and this defeat may do us good..
PS: I think Spain beat Serbia today as well.

[Trifilli]

In the meanwhile I saw the match vs Australia, here are some comments: Overall it was no good game, with a lot of turnovers on both sides (especially a lot of bad passes). Our defense was not very good but good - it was no full intensity game though and I always had the impression that both coaches didn't want to show everything their team can do (given that they'll play each other soon at the WC). Highlight of the game was Fotsis trying to simulate Michael Jordan flying through the zone - and only hitting the rim with the dunk
Our best player was Diamantidis imo, he organized the game well as usual, had some spectacular assists and played very good D as usual. Fotsis was very good as well, he was the only one who was shooting well. Spanoulis certainly didn't shoot well (rather the opposite) and made his only FG with a layup with 1.2 secs to go in the game. Papadopoulos had a good game, especially in the 2nd half, he missed some shots in the first, but his presence in the zone assured quite some space for the other players as he was double or even triple teamed pretty often. Another player with a pretty decent game was Kostas Tsartsaris, on the offensive end he didn't miss a shot, his defense could've been a bit better though. Chatzivrettas didn't play bad either while I didn't like Zisis in this game. Kakiouzis and Papaloukas were awful.
But oh well, it was just a prep game (and it was obvious that both teams considered it as such a game) - at least Greece got a nice practise playing against a zone and a zone press again

[wardjdim]

Greece played the smartest way possible in the first two games.
Weakening its own strong parts, so that the opponents and the viewers wouldnt be able to see how long can this team last.
In the first game, Greece had the game in an uptempo, offensive defense only for short stretches and played completely meaningless ball for 80% of the game. Vs France, Diamantidis was substituted pretty quickly, in order for the game not to reach double digits from the 1st period.
Greece was owned by France, but they played no ball at all. They ll likely do the same in the final game of the tournament and maybe also vs Qatar, in the opening match of the WC.
Greece will start playing ball from the second game of the WC onwards.