Ettore Messina on his players: “They played their heart and soul for 40 minutes”

2025-01-30T23:10:13+00:00 2025-01-30T23:37:48+00:00.

Aris Barkas

30/Jan/25 23:10

Eurohoops.net
Messina Armani Milano

Milan’s coach praised his players and the way they reacted after the worst defeat of the season.

By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net

After losing 44 points in Istanbul to Anadolu Efes, Milan rebounded with a big win over defending champions Panathinaikos and coach Ettore Messina took his hat off for his players.

This is not usual for a demanding coach like Messina, but he admitted that his players, despite missing Nikola Mirotic, Fabien Causeur and Josh Nebo from the active roster, had an amazing performance.

And he also gave his flowers to the Italian fans: “Obviously, it’s a great win and we are thankful to the fans who created a great atmosphere. Personally, I feel like one of our fans in the stands. I am very, very proud of our players, of the way they fought from the first minute, playing with great heart and also with good basketball because it’s not easy to score almost 90 points against this team and defend them”.

Messina explained how the amazing transformation of his team became an unexpected reality: “Last week, we were extremely depressed and extremely frustrated. We lost in the same game in Venice Bolmaro, Mirotic and LeDay went down on his shoulder. Zach asked to play Thursday (against Efes), he shouldn’t have played, but the team was so depressed to see so many injuries that we didn’t have any energy. Then they came back Sunday to play a good game and today they played their heart and soul for 40 minutes and now we move on to the next game”. 

 

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