“We wanted to return Salt to the EBA League since we were relegated”

2023-07-13 06:30:10

He CB Salt returns this season to the the EBA league, the fourth category of Spanish basketball. It does so thanks to the understanding with Basketball Gironawhich gives them their place in the category, in a move that allows the Saltans to recover the category they lost in 2019. There is desire and excitement in Salt for this new stage: “we wanted to go back there since we were relegated », points out the president Albert Marunyconvinced of being able to make a good team with the help of the ACB club, which gives them the place that the subsidiary had until now. The agreement is, for now, for this yearnot more.

«Ells they came looking for us and we saw it well, first to have EBA in Salt again, and all that entails having a team of this level, but also for strengthen the base, that the players who come up see this team as a mirror and get more involved with the club”, says Maruny. In this sense, he believes that recovering the EBA will also allow them to “capture better players for the lower teams, and strengthen the entity socially in the municipality This year we will have 25 federated teams, plus the schools in Pompeu Fabra, FEDAC Dominiques, Vilagran, and Escola El Gegant del Rec. In addition, with the Fundacio Elna we work with a couple of teams made up of players with mental disabilities».

The Salt will keep the Primera Catalana team, which until now was the main one, with Marc Jiménez as coach. Albert Maruny, who has been with the club for 14 years and who had previously been its coordinator, points out that “we will continue to work the same, with the difference that we will add the EBA team, occupying Plaça del Básquet Girona, but playing in Salt and with our name”. The club is about to lock down a main sponsor.

“The previous stage at EBA brought us a growth of the base, and brought a lot of people to the pavilion. It was a good thing for Salt, who often only goes out for negative things. We saw players who ended up in the ACB”, recalls the president. There is no ceiling. For now, have a good year, “but if the possibility arose to fight to go to LEB Plata we would consider it, it wouldn’t scare us at all”.

Scholarships to play basketball for underprivileged children

CB Salt has also been working for years on the inclusion of children with few economic resources, first as an individual club, second in collaboration with the City Council with the program “Juguem!” which has been operating for a decade, and third with a program of European funds that will start as a “pilot test” and in which 10 boys and 10 girls with few resources from La Farga School will receive scholarships. This way they will be able to start playing basketball and at the same time they will also have school support, such as English and other subjects that have yet to be defined.