“Saturday against Madrid will be even more difficult and with 45 minutes on”
BADALONA, 17 Feb. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Unicaja coach, Ibon Navarro, assured after beating Barça in extra time (87-89) in the quarterfinals of the Copa del Rey in Badalona that the success was thinking, before the clash, that they could win and, after doing so He is already thinking of a semifinal duel against Real Madrid that he foresees even more complicated.
“In the difficult moments we have put ourselves behind better and being even tougher. Forcing 12 losses to Barça has a lot of merit. The greatest success of the game is that we all thought we could win, that is the best victory”, he commented at a press conference .
Navarro asserted that the most important thing is that before the game there were people, in addition to the team, who thought they could win. “But I have already been in a Cup semifinal and they passed me over, precisely Unicaja. You have to rest because if today has been difficult, on Saturday even more. We will have a great rival in front of us and with 45 minutes on top”, he valued thinking about that semifinal.
But, after a tough battle against the current double Cup champion, he wanted to congratulate his team for a “very important victory of great merit.” “We have held on to everything, despite the rebounding problem, that 20 points went out of our way. In the end we found players with lucidity and scoring,” he celebrated.
“We used Will very well as a beacon to stay calm. Barça’s defense generated spaces and the team read them well. That’s where we compensated his points on the rebound. I’m very happy and proud of the team, also of Darío Brizuela and now we have to rest , that we have another game on Saturday,” he reiterated.
For his part, Darío Brizuela, Unicaja’s top scorer with 27 points, celebrated the victory in a “very tough” match. “We are very happy, with bad moments but we have been solid in defense at key moments. We have been close in the last quarter and in extra time we have been very good”, he celebrated.
“It’s everyone’s thing, it’s not just my game. Perry has had a great game and Thomas’ end has been amazing, too. I’m happy because everyone has played well and is happy”, he valued.
Looking ahead to Saturday, against Real Madrid imagine that it will be a game “just as hard or more” than this one. “It’s a game against a top-level rival in Europe. It’s something different from Barça, you have to rest and prepare the game as best you can,” he said.
On a personal level, he did not want to assess whether this was his best game with Unicaja. “I don’t know if it’s my best game but I’ve felt comfortable, a lot, from the beginning. I like these Cup games against tough rivals. But it’s not special because it’s Barcelona,” he denied.