Bartzokas: «We should play defense with intensity»

 Olympiacos has left the victory over Alba Berlin behind and has solely focused on tomorrow’s game against Fenerbahce (28/10, 20.00 CET) at the SEF. The goal is to win both games in the double game Euroleague week and to achieve that goal, according to coach Giorgos Bartzokas, the ‘reds’ should play hard defense.

“Fener is a very good team. They lost their last two games in the last possession to Barcelona and Real. However, I think that in those two games they proved their dynamics and quality. They do have a full and quality roster”, our team’s coach stressed and went on to say: “We will have to play with more intensity in defense. Last night, we might have had in mind that we were going to win anyway and our performance defense wise was lacking. In the offense, we had a pretty descend game. But, we should have played much more intense defense, harder and of course this is what we need to do tomorrow, because they are a team with lots of talent, they have facilitation from the point guards, they have good scoring from their guards and very talented big players. Booker and Vesely are players in the ‘5’ and ‘4’ position that play together and are very strong in rebounding, rim protection… Of course they have weaknesses as well that we need to expose on the floor”.

Asked whether the key will be for Olympiacos to ‘stop’ Jan Vesely, he replied: “Coaches don’t think about stopping any one player. Everything depends on co-operations. There are too many plays in basketball and you cannot just stop a player. At this level, if you manage to contain one player, you’re gonna get hurt by somebody else. We are going to be focusing on 4-5 areas that they rely their offensive game on, to have plan and remain focused on it. We will also need to play hard. You see how teams play within the Euroleague. Everyone loses to everyone else. If you are not mentally tough and ready, you lose”.