By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Anadolu Efes head coach Ergin Ataman didn’t want to talk about the technical aspects of his team’s win over Gran Canaria before expressing his complaints on the slipperiness of the floor of “Gran Canaria Arena.”
“I want to direct attention to the fact that it’s not possible to play a basketball game on this slippery floor. It’s not possible to play a EuroLeague basketball game,” Ataman said in the post-game press conference and then added that Efes guard Shane Larkin got injured in a pre-game practice as a result of how slippery the floor was.
“Teams are making investments of 10, 20, 30 million dollars for players. Yesterday Shane Larkin got injured during practice. We don’t know for how many weeks he will not play. During the game, nine or ten times, maybe eleven times… all the players were slipping. So it’s not possible to play basketball. What can I tell to my players? I told them to play defense but they were not staying in their positions. This is important. EuroLeague must pay attention and resolve this problem.”
Gran Canaria head coach Salva Maldonado said the following when asked about Ataman’s comments. “I have other problems. We also play here. I’m not going to complain about the floor. I saw that they varnished it a few days ago. I’m not going to do a floor analysis when I have no idea. If it affects, it affects both teams.”