“They gave us a 7% chance of a medal, we’ll see.”

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A National Basketball Team Head Coach Ergin Ataman said that they will fight to win a medal in the European Championship, which will start on September 1st.

Experienced head coach and national player Furkan Korkmaz made a statement to the press after the training in Tbilisi Arena, where the National Team will play the group matches in the championship.

Ergin Ataman stated that they made the final preparations before the championship, “Tomorrow, we will start the preparation of the opponent rather than the preparation of the tournament. Every match in this type of tournament is very dangerous. Montenegro, where we will play our first match, is a dangerous team, they have experienced players. That’s why we have to go on the field with determination. We need to focus on winning the matches instead of thinking about where we will be in the group. We have made the necessary preparations. Yiğitcan Saybir was also included in the squad. Furkan Korkmaz had a slight injury. We rested him today, but I don’t think there will be a problem tomorrow.” he said.

Ataman on a question about the problems in defense during the matches played against Latvia and Serbia in the FIBA ​​2023 World Cup European Qualifiers“The squad we have has features. We are trying to go beyond those features. With this squad, we found a 5 that can defend in the second half of the match against Serbia. We will make our preparations tactically according to the squad we have. We are not a defensive team, this is clearly evident. “We don’t have any players. But we can do team defense and helping each other well. Whatever happens, their offensive performance will be extremely important.” made its assessment.

Noting that Spain seems to be the strongest team of the group on paper, Ataman said, “In particular, teams such as Montenegro, Belgium and the host Georgia are always dangerous teams. Bulgaria seems a little weak compared to its performance in the qualifiers, but we’ll see.‘ he commented.

Ergin Ataman emphasized that the balance of power was not very important before such important tournaments and continued his words as follows:

There is a point that surprised me, FIBA ​​has published a balance of power. I’m seeing this for the first time. As an official institution, it is extremely wrong of you to publish what percentage of the medal chance of a team. Journalists may publish this privately, but it is highly questionable to me that the international federation, which organizes the tournament, predicts such a medal. It can also create a foresight on the referees. That’s why I say that I find it very wrong. They gave us a 7% chance of a medal. We will see. We came to this European Championship to get medals. I repeat, I find the statement made by FIBA ​​extremely objectionable, this is the first time I have encountered such a thing.