EC 2007 summary & impressions

[Civilis]

Congratulations once more to Russia for this amazing and (un)expected victory Yesterday I really felt split as to which team I should support: Russia was underdog, yet played nice team basketball, while Spain were hosts with the best ever Spanish NT that should finally win something else than Eurosilver.

Although it was sad watching the faces of Spanish players, in the end I was satisfied with the outcome because:

1. Everything was created for the Spanish victory, even the schedule - can you imagine that both 1st and 2nd places in the 1/8finals of the Spanish group had one day break between the 1/4finals and semis, while the leaders on the other side had not? The schedule was definitely set up to facilitate the Spanish way to the crown - and I am glad it failed

2. Lack of public interest in other games of the tournament where no Spanish NT is involved. Please, show more respect for the European basketball competition, not only the national pride.

3. All these technical problems in organization were quite annoying.

Overall, this Eurobasket had probably the most tense games for as long as I can remember. The level of competition in Europe is rising, and the cost of medals becomes higher every year. Can't wait for the next year's Olympics and Eurobasket2009 - can you imagine how many Lithuanians will come to neighbouring country???

[achinet]

Congratulations once more to Russia for this amazing and (un)expected victory Yesterday I really felt split as to which team I should support: Russia was underdog, yet played nice team basketball, while Spain were hosts with the best ever Spanish NT that should finally win something else than Eurosilver.

Although it was sad watching the faces of Spanish players, in the end I was satisfied with the outcome because:

1. Everything was created for the Spanish victory, even the schedule - can you imagine that both 1st and 2nd places in the 1/8finals of the Spanish group had one day break between the 1/4finals and semis, while the leaders on the other side had not? The schedule was definitely set up to facilitate the Spanish way to the crown - and I am glad it failed

2. Lack of public interest in other games of the tournament where no Spanish NT is involved. Please, show more respect for the European basketball competition, not only the national pride.

3. All these technical problems in organization were quite annoying.

Overall, this Eurobasket had probably the most tense games for as long as I can remember. The level of competition in Europe is rising, and the cost of medals becomes higher every year. Can't wait for the next year's Olympics and Eurobasket2009 - can you imagine how many Lithuanians will come to neighbouring country???

So you conclussion, Spain organization was horrible, Spanish TV was horrible, Spanish espectator were horrible. Are we like that?? are we so horrible??

[Civilis]

No, it was not horrible. I did not say it. However, the expectations were higher than the reality Please, do not generalize, just argue with the points I made. The schedule, public interest (i.e. marketing of the event) and the technical issues could really be resolved better in the future.

[achinet]

No, it was not horrible. I did not say it. However, the expectations were higher than the reality Please, do not generalize, just argue with the points I made. The schedule, public interest (i.e. marketing of the event) and the technical issues could really be resolved better in the future.

Perhaps the days of the semis were wrong, yes but i remember moust of you saying that the path of Spain to reach the final were easiest and that the teams of spanish group were(1st phase, and 2nd fase) were easiest, look the classification. Where is Italy, Turkey, France and Servia??
And yes there were some technical problems with the 24 seconds in some games (it is that so bad), we are also humans. The public interest...i see the moust of the games and the attendance was not bad (i've seen it worst in other EC).

And last, if the organization tryed to do agreements for a spanish win it dosn't matter becouse we are really bad in thats things.
Spain is the worst country in its host Olympics (not only basket, all sports). We are the worst in our host socer WC. We did't wi8n our basket WC, we didn't win our basket EC (did you remember that Germany in its own EC?). And a lot of examples in other sports. So don't worry about that.

[BlackAdder]

So you conclussion, Spain organization was horrible, Spanish TV was horrible, Spanish espectator were horrible. Are we like that?? are we so horrible??

No, your food is amazing, wine as well (aaaa, anything from Ribera del Duero 2000 harvest), country is wonderful, people are amazing, architecture beautiful and diverse, nightlife amazing, club football always a joy to watch, international football - less but exciting, so there are a lot of wonderful things about Spain. Sometimes more than could be said about other countries.
On the other hand, does it take a lot to admit that you are not the best in organizing things that even 90 percent of your public does not care about? And you're not alone among plenty of Western European countries that could not care less about basketball.
And having scoreboards to go off twice during the little final is a disgrace to any organizing country, Spain or not Spain. I don't care much about Spanish TV, Lithuanian broadcasting was awful as well.

[Javiky]

On the other hand, does it take a lot to admit that you are not the best in organizing things that even 90 percent of your public does not care about?

feel free to say, we are "master of dissaster" organizing events. it´s true.


P.S. if you like Ribera del duero, I have to make you a proposal (decent, of course). In my cellar I have got some Ribera del Duero cabeza cuba,1982. came to Spain and we will open a bottle (no more, it cost a lot and I don´t like wine)

[achinet]

No, your food is amazing, wine as well (aaaa, anything from Ribera del Duero 2000 harvest), country is wonderful, people are amazing, architecture beautiful and diverse, nightlife amazing, club football always a joy to watch, international football - less but exciting, so there are a lot of wonderful things about Spain. Sometimes more than could be said about other countries.
On the other hand, does it take a lot to admit that you are not the best in organizing things that even 90 percent of your public does not care about? And you're not alone among plenty of Western European countries that could not care less about basketball.
And having scoreboards to go off twice during the little final is a disgrace to any organizing country, Spain or not Spain. I don't care much about Spanish TV, Lithuanian broadcasting was awful as well.

Yes, i think that football is eating other sports here, thats the problem.

[BlackAdder]

feel free to say, we are "master of dissaster" organizing events. it´s true.


P.S. if you like Ribera del duero, I have to make you a proposal (decent, of course). In my cellar I have got some Ribera del Duero cabeza cuba,1982. came to Spain and we will open a bottle (no more, it cost a lot and I don´t like wine)

Man, you've got me there I'll definitely come now

[Joško Poljak Fan]

here comes the novel

overall game
I actually believe this was one of the worst EC's in terms of performance of most teams. both semifinals, games for gold and broze improved that image, since some of them were spectacular, but still there was quite a surprising ammount of low quality games during the group phase. Maybee it's because Fiba prolongued the tournament, but I do believe it should stay this way since overall team's performance has bigger effect on the result as in the past and teams are able to survive one or two bad games, which are afterall something normall.
I think in the next EC it'd be hard to see as underperforming Turkey, Serbia, Italy... while to my belief Montenegro might get there by than adding one more dangerous team to the list.

referee criteria
don't like the direction of it. Some logical things tend to get complicated in this tournament such as deliberate miss of a free throw (c'mmon, that's a part of the game? right?!), accidental "playing with the leg" (might only be my personal opinion, but to me there is a big difference when someone is playing with the leg deliberately trying to gain advantage, or ball hitting the leg of a player, which didn't even move it, which should be considered solely as the mistake of the guy handling the ball- you can see some referees moving in that direction, but obviously not on this tournament)
The overall refereeing was poor, not because of that ussual poor Fiba's ref's we've all got used to, but because the criteria went from one extreme to the other in a matter of two games. They imo missed their job by talking it out before the tournament in order for most referees having at least some simmilar criteria. It was especially obvious in the post and it's frustrating, from a game with Italy by allowing only soft game in the paint, followed by a game vs. Poland where beating up was allowed- of course I lost my nerves untill realising it's just the ref criteria, not some sort of bias all fans are looking for actually, that varies too much.

organisation
I don't want any spaniard to take this personaly, since I don't consider whole nation responsible hellooo!? ...it's the matter of organisers that are responsible for some flaws. Things such as one team having one day more for a rest is a matter of Fiba and yeah it is a bit disturbing, no matter noone will try to be a sore looser pointing it out explicitely. I personaly was really disturbed by the quality of the broadcasts (if I understood it correctly provided by LaSexta), lack of replays, lack of statistics, loads of chicks (I've got some more interesting stuff on TV If I want to watch those) and director of the broadcasts imo deserves a negative grade. I hope Fiba will manage to realise they have to demand some standards on that area, quality of the broadcast might not be everything, but it helps a lot to getting the game closer to the fan, calms down passion as well when clearing out at first sight arguable referee decisions. With all the money Fiba makes from this event they should take care of that and also they should get someone creating aditional content, even if they're not responsible for it (if you only do things up to what you're supposed to do, than sorry), actually loads of that...

Slovenia
well... hurts... but after some reconsideration, remebering what some people were saying before the tournament about the short bench I can't resent them anything. Even Lebowski can't deny a mediocre Čapin playing 10 minutes per game is better than Lakovič "playing aditional 2 and a half more games" on a whole tournament, with all the pressure since being the only dangerous guard we've had, ending up completely wasted when entering the 4th quarter (not to mention leaving out a week in preparation stages helped either). When you enter the last quarter vs. Greece like that, it's obvious... tiredness, inexperience, along with Greece flying on wings... still some bad luck needed, but nothing miracleous or unlogical. If it was some other team, that excuse would fail... but it was Greece.
Lakovič really screwed up at some points, but it's a part of the game and I doubt there was really any other player at this tournament that received as much attention and was as tired as Jaka was... so absolutely no harsh feelings on him, only "thank you" for fighting he performed.
It seems Smodiš wants to retire after olympics as well, so it'll be one of the last chances for the remainings of the "old" generation. Dragič was a nice revelation, one aditional year in Olimpija should make him improve even more and next time I think I can clearly say other teams won't be dealing with only 8 man in rotations when dealing with Slovenia, chemistry might be a question there, but I am an optimist... leaving out Brezec, Bečirovič, Ožbolt, Udrih, Vujačič, Tušek, Joksimovič if anyone would even thing about causing troubles- don't care, as long as we get a calm&nice guy in Nachbar (that imo really shouldn't represent a chemistry problems, he is just too nice of a guy for that) along with workers as Maravič/Milič on SF, one year older Vidmar, Preldžič, D. Lorbek and Klobučar... i'm optimistic for the future

the champion
I was bashing that "playing with 4 SF's and Holden" mentality, but with Hryapa, Kirilenko, Monya, Morgunov and the likes, that lineup was indeed able to adapt to any offense they've met... just wow...

Ex-Yu
partially connected with the attendace in Madrid... some people were asking themselves if bball will die in ex-Yu... you've seen the attendance Belgrade was able to put up nevermind their NT dissapointed them in a very very harsh way, meaning: no way bball could die there. It is receiving a hard blow after another in recent period, first in times of Yugoslavia a powerhouse Bosnia copeing with the war, later Slovenia, Croatia, now Serbia going down... results might vary, but especially Croatia and Serbia have too strong of a fundaments for the game to collapse as many would suppose and that's an enormous advantage in front of most countries...
Croatia might just be going back on track with their young team, nevermind that Germany debacle...

[LuDux]

I guess people are so disappointed by organization because they kept hearing that ACB is best organized league in Europe. and expected same from EC.

[rikhardur]

Yes, i think that football is eating other sports here, thats the problem.

Well, if football is eating other sports there and you guys still manage to reach finals and win international championships in various sports, guess what's happening in Portugal, football devours everything

[BlackAdder]

Well, if football is eating other sports there and you guys still manage to reach finals and win international championships in various sports, guess what's happening in Portugal, football devours everything

Indeed, I edit Lithuanian version of men's lifestyle magazine FHM and we always have a bet whenever a new issue from our Portuguese colleagues arrives - will they have only one feature about football or two In our case it's a different story, we strive to give coverage both to basketball and football events, more funny and emotionally charged in the case of former, and more info oriented and "things-to-do" style in the case of latter.

[Jan van Grabski]

Russia : European champion for the first time
Spain : Silver medal .....again
Lithuania : Bronze....for the first time
Greece: Without Bronze......again


It was exciting tournament with unexpected but deserved winner. We saw some crazy buzzer beaters, passion, tension, acting, fighting, almost everything. I will remember for a long time Slovenia – Greece game, and an amazing comeback – THIS IS SPARTA, lol The last five minutes of that game should be put on tape and shown in all BB schools, just to learn a very important lesson to never give up. Respect Greece. Then top thriller – Greece-Spain, god i was watching this game with my mouth opened the whole time. Lastly, Spain – Russia, seeing is believing, against all odds, for me that was mental victory of Russians over Spain. You are not a Champion until you prove it on the court.

[ziv]

1. i don't get the spectator critque. as far as you saw and read it was more than ok. there were some appearnce mistakes (those white sofas or the working-space) but numbers says fans were coming. i was surprised to see thousnds in israel's group stage games, not too many greeks and serbians, but mostly locals. i realy think crowd-wise it was more than ok.
2. resting time - just to remind you that last time there were 2 teams resting for 5 straight days in the middle of the championship. basiclly - the exact opposite to what we had this time. spain, btw, was one of them. the teams saw it (then) as a negative schedule. i agree. so they try to change this time. maybe not the best schedule but last time it wasn't better and i don't recall such anger over it. personally - i see the unfairness claim as kinda weak, 2 hours of extra rest when playing back-to-back-to-back games has a meaning but it's not that big as it being disscused here.
3. refs - way too many fights and wired calls. i think there are 2 reasons for it. the first is the lack of later reaction. the milicic scandel is the obvious example but it's not the only one. no harm is being done if fiba personal watch tapes and decied to fine a player after the game was being played. nba does it (speaking of which - in the nba a player was kicked for the way he was looking at a ref. a player, probably the nicest guy in the league and one of the best players. fiba couldn't eject a player cursing and threating the refs... the nba ref was later taken care of but that's the main difference - give the refs totaly back-up but when they get off the sporting-track handle them personally). second thing, fiba decided not to bring the older generation of refs. barazauskas, jungbrand, pitsilskas, sudek etc. it's not only the quality (belosvic is regareded as a top offical) but the experince and respect these guys get from players and coaches. some one to calm the games were realy needed.

not a word (yet) about b-ball...

[Stardusted]

Now that Eurobasket is over, a big salute to all the posters and their NTs.

Flames and spams aside, agreeing or disagreeing, a salute to all with who we discussed in civilized or not so civilized ways this eurobasket.

It was one of the things that made it a little more tasty after all, just like when we discuss it with our friends and families.

Be well, love the game, and if you can, play it too!

Now let the Euroleague season begin...