By Antonis Stroggylakis/ info@eurohoops.net
Italy may be 0/2 in the “Akropolis Tournament”, the last lap of preparation matches ahead of the EuroBasket, after narrowly losing to Serbia and Greece (in OT). But results rarely matter in these friendly games as Ettore Messina is quite aware of.
In fact, despite these two defeats, the head coach of the “Azzurri” notes the progress his players have made in various areas of the game and, perhaps more importantly, the work ethic that they have been following throughout the preparation period and already manifests on the floor.
“I liked a lot of things in those games,” Messina told Eurohoops. “First of all, we competed. We improve game by game in situations like the balance in our offense, inside and outside, for example. We are learning to hide our weaknesses and trying to best use our strengths.”
– Coach, this team looks more resilient and defensively tougher in comparison with previous summer tournaments. What can you tell me about the defensive focus of your team?
– “We lost a player (Danilo Gallinari) who gave us about 19 points per game in the previous EuroBasket tournament. Of course, everyone needs to make a step up offensively in order to score a little bit more. But we knew that we have to defend. As you said, we need to have resilience and togetherness. I think that this is the nicest part of this team. This is a great group of people. They work extremely hard. And I’m proud of them.”
– After Danilo’s injury, you were asked what are the things can you build on with the team and mentioned some “forgotten values…”
– “… As I’ve said, we know what we are missing but probably there are some… old words like “togetherness”, “hard work”, like “self-sacrifice” that aren’t very common on these days and we can find.”
– And have you found those “words”?
– “So far yes. For sure. Believe me: My players had a very hard, very tough preparation. And they work extremely hard every day. You know what? Sometimes even myself, that see them every day, I forget that this spirit of attitude and self-sacrifice isn’t granted even for these professionals. It’s an important thing to have. A big value.”
– Danilo is out and so are players like Andrea Bargnani or Alessandro Gentile. It’s definitely a far less talented outfit, compared to previous summers.
– “Of course, you want talent on your team. Your ideal situation is having talent combined with the spirit of sacrifice. Some of these players aren’t here and that’s not because we didn’t want them. But because they put themselves out of the whole situation through their acts. That’s where we are now.”
– How do you feel about this being your last stint at the helm of the Italian national team?
– “I accepted the request of the Federation to stay one more year to try to help these kids. I’m an old man now. It’s been a lot of years that I’ve been doing this and I have had my share of satisfactions. I think it was my duty to try to help this team, this generation. For some players, this might be their last European Championship. The situation in the EuroBasket is really balanced. There are probably 3-4 teams that are considered above all others. The important thing is to be in the single-game elimination phase. Once you’re there… anything can happen.”