Barça, for the challenge of knocking down Maccabi in Tel Aviv
BARCELONA, Nov. 9 (EUROPA PRESS) –
Barça visits Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv this Thursday at the Menora Mivtachim Arena (20.05), on matchday 7 of the Euroleague Regular Phase, with the challenge of defeating an Israeli team that has not yet lost at home but , on the other hand, comes from being overwhelmed by Baskonia in Vitoria.
A new challenge for a Barça team that beat Fenerbahçe (81-80) at the Palau Blaugrana last matchday, ending the Turkish team’s record of defeats at zero until then. Now, who hasn’t lost yet –before his fans– is Maccabi.
After beating Milan and Fenerbahçe, Barça is now at the top of the table and seems to have found a good path from which they don’t want to deviate. To do this, they will have to do what seemed impossible again, because knocking out ‘Fener’, even by one point, was unattainable for the rest of the teams until Barça arrived.
Now they visit Tel Aviv, where Panathinaikos (85-74), ASVEL Villeurbanne (88-69), AS Monaco (78-70) and Zalgiris Kaunas (84-83) have lost. An undoubtedly hot feud, which once again believes in his team and which will make it difficult for Barça in a small good streak that Sarunas Jasikevicius’s men seek to lengthen.
Without a doubt, a close duel between the sixth classified (Maccabi) and the fifth (Barça), both with a balance of 4-2 in the table. And, in terms of head-to-head, the thing is 16-13 in favor of Barça but Maccabi has won the last five games, including last year’s 85-68 in Tel Aviv or the tough 80-104 at Palau. There will be a desire for revenge between the Blaugranas.
After beating Marc Gasol’s Bàsquet Girona (72-69) in the Catalan duel last matchday in the Endesa League, Barça is experiencing a sweet moment, knowing that it can beat the greats in both competitions and that, no matter how much I miss him, he can win without Nikola Mirotic from whom there is still no hope that he will return soon.
Without the Hispanic-Montenegrin, Barça is using its outside players, both point guard Nicolás Laprovittola –top scorer with an average of 12.8 points– and versatile Tomas Satoransky –back this season and, for now, the best rated with 13.7 points–.
Opposite will be a Maccabi that has been almost completely reformed to return to the elite that it was out of in recent years. And, among the signings, that of the Spanish nationalized point guard Lorenzo Brown, his top scorer and assistant (16.3 and 6.8 on average).
MACCABI PLAYTIKA TEL AVIV: Brown, Baldwin IV, Hollins, Poythress and Nebo –possible starting quintet–; Adams, Menco, Sorkin, Dibartolomeo, Hilliard, Cohen, and Colson.
BARÇA: Laprovittola, Satoransky, Kalinic, Tobey and Sanli –possible starting quintet–; Da Silva, Paulí, Vesely, Abrines, Higgins, Jokubaitis and Nnaji.
–REFEREES: Ryzhyk, Rocha and Panther.
–PAVILLION: Menora Mivtachim Arena.
