After three consecutive losses in the Euroleague and also stumbles in the local league against Urbani Ness Ziona, Maccabi Tel Aviv will try today (Thursday) at 21:05 to return to the positive track when it will host the Russian Onyx Kazan at Menora Mivtachim Hall. Ahead of the match, Yannis Sapropoulos spoke at the press conference Which was broadcast live here on the site.
“Finally after five weeks we are back to play on our home field, although we played against Monaco but it was part of a double week and now we are without a flight for the first time in five weeks,” he began. Yannis Sapropoulos His words. “I hope the hall will be sold out, we want to keep the house and together with the fans fight for the victory tomorrow. It is a game that is very important to us in several respects: first of all to get back on track with the positive results, secondly we are playing against a team that is competing with us for a place in the playoffs. “
The coach went on to talk about the keys to victory: “They are a very good team defensively and offensively, they have players who are able to score 25-30 points and it is important for us to try to stop them. They use a lot of exchanges on defense and we will have to read them well and play the right way, play smart and constantly try to find the weak links in their defense to attack them. These are the keys to tomorrow’s game and as I said, we are very worried about this game. “
The Greek expanded on the Russian rival: “This is a tough rival. This is a team that is fighting and has players who know how to make a good defense. They have some great defensive players and some great scorers, so they can do a lot of things. Canaan is a great scorer, John Brown a great keeper. Kazan has a lot of players that can cause you problems during the game. We have to be very focused to play the game the way we want to play and not be dragged where Kazan wants to lead it. “
Sapropolos also referred to the team mentality and its recent losses and said: “We need to change our mentality. I do not link the losses. Against Ness Ziona we came with a low mental capacity, but against Real Madrid we fought and lost, also against Alba Berlin we came with a good mentality, but we could not win, after that Alba defeated Milan and we see that there are surprising results in the Euroleague. We have a problem with mental preparation. I can not say we did not play well in Moscow or Madrid, we had good games but did not win and as I said at the beginning, we have to win tomorrow, we want the victory tomorrow, one of the reasons is to get back on track and see our good mentality again. We work well and we will improve from week to week. “
On the ability of James Nanley recently, he said: “I’m not worried. A player can score 20 points in one game and in the other he will score only four points, for me this is not the only measure, but also data like defense, dedication and black work, not just shooting. “Every player should be willing to help in a variety of ways in the game, if the players do that I am very happy with them.”
Regarding the rotations and loads, Sapropoulos said: “I wanted to have a long staff so I could use more players and as you saw in Madrid the bench players were ready to play and reacted really well. I hope they continue like this because the team needs everyone, I need all the players to be ready, we can not play with only seven or eight players, this is a long season with 80 games, it is impossible to play with a short staff so I expected all the players to be ready. There are those for whom this is their first Euroleague appearance, not only Israelis, but also among foreigners, the first time they play two or three games a week, it is not easy. “
The coach added: “You have to understand that we are still building our team and we are still learning how to play together and how to play hard games ‘back to back’ and three games in five days. I know the players are trying, I have no complaint against them. Makes sense during the season that we will have ups and downs, it does not just happen to us. We need to know how to learn to play in the best way we can. “
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