By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net
Serbia coach Svetislav Pesic believes that EuroLeague Basketball should include more teams in the competition while, at the same time, decreasing the number of games with a return to the format before the round-robin system was established from 2016-17.
“The number of games should be reduced,” Pesic said in an interview with Mozzart. “It should via via the system that was in place before, while the number of teams should be increased to 24, as it was previously. After that we had the Top 16 stage, the quarterfinals and the Final Four. It was all at a high level, there was great interest and good business. I’m not in favor of drastically reducing the number of games but to look at the interest of the players and the competition because now we have what you journalists write about and EuroLeague coaches constantly saying that there never was a stronger EuroLeague. I don’t agree with that.”
“I really think that in EuroLeague, we don’t need this kind of EuroLeague competition system with 18 clubs, where 34 rounds are played and now Play-In is introduced,” Pesic, a veteran EuroLeague coach and champion in 2003 with Barcelona, said. “Every time the number o games increases and the space for national leagues decreases.”
Pesic, who has won practically every type of tournament there is to win as head coach outside the NBA, including the World Cup (2002) and the EuroBasket (1993, 2001), thinks that the large number of EuroLeague games also hurts the development of young players and the quality of the product.
“It has never happened that you watch a large number of the same games,” Pesic mentioned. “As many games as you want, you slowly get into the rhythm of the NBA, even though here there is a system with 18 clubs and you have to go for victories. Such a large number of games in the national leagues and the Euroleague does not allow players to develop. European basketball cannot live and develop without players. Because the production of players will decrease with this kind of competition system. Because there is no time. In Europe, there are representative competitions. There is no such thing in the NBA. Yes Let me be clear… Now everyone will say – yes, but we need matches for business… True, but in the long run, the most important thing for a good business is still quality. And quality is down on the field. If there is no quality, that you will not be able to offer the product to sponsors or fans. That’s why I responsibly say that the power of the national leagues must be returned, and that international competitions within the Euroleague should be designed in such a way that the number of matches is reduced, not drastically, but adjusted, or better said . Whether the format will be with the Top 16 phase or whether two zones will be created, where a larger number of clubs will play, is the question.”