F4 in Barcelona, without Barcelona
I must say, “I love this game”. I am very happy because we will not watch Regal Barcelona in Final 4 in Barcelona, May 6-8.
I am especially glad because of our Serbian Coach, Zeljko Obradovic who beat Regal Barcelona last night in crowded OAKA Arena. In fantastic atmosphere Panathinaikos beat Regal Barcelona and qualify to Final 4.
Many people were worried that referees will play their role in this match-up and help Barcelona but it just didn’t happen. Obradovic’s players did a fantastic job on the court and deserves Final 4.
In semifinals, May 6, we will watch:
Maccabi Electra vs. (Real Madrid/Power Electronics Valencia)
Panathinaikos vs. Montepaschi Siena
Maccabi have to wait until April 6 or 7 (still not decided) for Game 5 between Real Madrid and Power Electronics Valencia. Hopefully Coach Svetislav Pesic will find solution to beat Real Madrid and qualify with his team to Final 4. And who knows, maybe Pesic will become new Head Coach of Real Madrid, there are some rumors in basketball world.
Dusan Ivkovic, Head coach of Olympiacos commented reasons why his team failed to qualify to Final 4:
“This a very difficult match we started very poorly and lost in the first quarter. When you get 50 points in the first half from team such as Siena is hard to go back. In the third quarter we were approaching the opponent, but we did not have enough energy to make a comeback. We worked hard in the first two phases of the Euroleague, yielded unfortunately, in the playoffs. Hairston has been a major problem for us. I can not blame only Papaloukas, who is our best defensive player, because we were a group and supposed to act as a group on the court. Montepaschi Siena was better and deserved to go further.”