ibon navarro appeared before the press this Wednesday to talk about the news surrounding the green team, which this week has doble league duel at home: this Thursday at 8:30 p.m. on the Brogán court, and on Sunday, from 5 p.m., on the Casademont Zaragoza court.
Navarro does not trust Breogán, his next rival. “Breogán lost important players last summer, it seemed that the level was going to drop, but his new players have entered the dynamic well, with Veljko who has put a very aggressive team stamp, which generates many errors, many turnovers … When they are successful from the outside they can beat Madrid by 20, but when they are not so successful they also compete in every action, in every rebound, in every defense. They have very hungry players. They are a team that is always competing. It is one of the surprises of the League. In the heat of their public they are tremendously dangerous. Their fans push them a lot,” he explained.
The typesetter technician revealed that there are no physical problems in his squad. “On a physical level, the team is fine. It’s not going to be a very comfortable trip because we’ve only had 7 days to prepare it, but we have to continue making use of our long squad, with short rotations to be able to feel good. These are two outings from Lugo and Zaragoza against two teams that are going further and that have nothing to do with what they were two months ago,” he said.
Despite last weekend’s victory against Obradoiro, Navarro believes that the team must improve its image at the Pazo in order to beat Breogán. “We didn’t play our best game against Obradoiro in terms of intensity and defense, but our team is in a good state of mind and if they’re in good shape, have a good time and compete, we don’t need to sacrifice to have a chance of winning. What we need is to enjoy to be able to compete. We have to play our game in Lugo”.
The Final Four, on the horizon
He was also questioned by the German Telekom Bonn, a team that qualified for the BCL Final Four on Tuesday. “Telekom Bonn is a team that plays very cheerfully, apparently with few systems but it has many rules, many well-executed well-trained readings. He has a very important player in TJ Shorts, but then he has other players who help a lot. He has a very high pace and a very aggressive style. It was seen that they were doing well and they are a very good team and a candidate not only to be in the Final Four but also to win it,” he assured.
On whether the final fight for the title will be in Jerusalem or in Malaga, a question that depends on the final result of the Hapoel-AEK match this Wednesday, in which a victory for the Greeks would make it possible to eliminate the Israeli team and that Martín Carpena outside the headquarters of the Final Four, Navarro did not get much wet: “We will see where the Final Four is played. I think the quarterfinal matches will be interesting. Hapoel has been inferior to AEK, I would say that in 3 of the 8 quarters of their tie until now. Let’s see…” she finished.