Ponsarnau is aware that they must “go down to mud” To compete on Sunday in Miribilla with Leyma Coruña and achieve a victory that would give them permanence in the Endesa League in a mathematical way. “We already had respect for this Coruña, but now even more,” said Bilbao Basket coach at the press conference prior to the game when he was reminded of the victory achieved on Thursday against Barcelona that keeps the Galician team alive in his fight to avoid the descent.
“It is a normal situation would be surprising, but now it can happen and it is a symptom that Coruña is fine. In the last games it has been more solid in defense and with a very competitive proposal. The goal is to understand the game 40 minutes or more and be calm, but tense to find our rhythm and our game,” he reflected.
Ponsarnau, on the other hand, revealed that he will not know until the last minute if he can count on De Ridder, afflicted with a “small muscle break” and with his immediate future in the NCAA, such as Rubén Domínguez, and with Cazalon, which is recovered from the ankle injury that has prevented him from playing the last games.
“From the rest I have more satisfaction than last week. I have the feeling that we are not in our plenary, but the team is responsible because it knows what we play in these last games. We do not have one hundred percent of sensations, but we play at home and we need our people to help us, ”he said.
The Catalan said that in the face of sealing permanence and occupying the best possible position at the end of the regular league “the only account” is “doing everything possible to win on Sunday.”
“Then we will make other accounts. From moments they are so wide that all we know is that what is going very well is to win this game. The two teams are pressured, but surely they would prefer to be in our position,” he said.
-Ponsarnau, finally, expressed his “illusion” for being able to perform the honor serve on San Mamés on Sunday before Athletic-Alavés. “We congratulate Athletic for their journey in Europe. They have gone far and have had to meet a great rival, a couple of unfortunate minutes and an expulsion that has conditioned the tie. But they still have very beautiful challenges ahead and ‘Aupa Athletic’ so they can get them,” he concluded.
Diego Epifanio acknowledged that the victory against Barça is “a chute of energy” To face this Sunday’s decisive match, in which his team plays his few options to continue in the elite. “Bilbao is a dangerous team, which also feels very comfortable at home. It is a very important match for the classification, we hope to recover from the effort of the match against Barça to be able to compete before a team that on his track is taking a lot of performance to his weapons,” said the coach of Coruña.
The Burgos coach points to Hlinason as “the internal reference” of the set directed by Ponsarnau, which also has “many points and a lot of talent” in the perimeter. “The scoreing capacity of its exteriors and the generation of its bases are other of their weapons,” said Epifanio, who highlighted the performance of Ridder. “He is one of the young players to follow. It has been a success to bet on a player with a lot of ability to score, to throw the ball to the ground and with a great physical capacity that helps him in the rebound,” he analyzed.
The Coruña basketball coach hopes to recover the Pivot Lima and is less optimistic with the participation of the American Thompkins, who continues to recover from the knee injury suffered before the Granada. “Trey is doing the maximum to arrive, but I don’t think I can get. To see what feelings it has tomorrow and then we will decide,” said Epiphany, which He praised his next opponent, from which he separates four victories in the absence of four days.
“It is a team that has the scoring very distributed among all its players. It is a team that especially takes care of the ball, their numbers say because it is the second team that has less ball losses in the competition. That makes them very good defenders of the first seconds, which also helps to be one of the five best teams at points received, ”he said.
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