Olympiacos host Fenerbahce on Thursday as the final round of EuroLeague games of 2016 gets underway.
The Greek side though will be without the services of Georgios Printezis for the top-of-the-table clash in Piraeus as his knee injury, sustained in last week’s win against Zalgiris hasn’t heeled in time.
Even with Printezis out, this promises to be a highly competitive contest with both sides on 9-5 records having been at the opposite end of results last week. Olympiacos blew a 14-point lead in their loss on the road to Brose Bamberg, while Fenerbahce pulled out a memorable overtime win in Moscow against CSKA.
“This will be the last game of the first round in EuroLeague,” Fenerbahce coach Zeljko Obradovic said. “We’ll play against a team, which has played many years together with the same coach. Olympiacos is a very experienced and talented team. It is always very difficult to play in Piraeus. So, we really expect very difficult and tough game.”
∞∞∞ CSKA LOOK TO BOUNCE BACK IN BELGRADE ∞∞∞
CSKA Moscow travel to Crvena Zvezda on Thursday as guard Milos Teodosic returns to his homeland.
For Red Star, they are coming off an upset win over second-placed Real Madrid and will be itching to overcome the side that swept them in last season’s EuroLeague Playoffs.
CSKA might welcome back Nando De Colo for Thursday’s encounter.
“To analize this match is not so difficult, because CSKA is playing great this season, ran by Milos Teodosic and Nando De Colo,” Crvena Zvezda coach Dejan Radonic said. “They score more than 90 points per game in EuroLeague action with more than 20 assists to boot. And even without Teodosic and De Colo, they manage to win difficult games.
“They have so many good high-profile players, and also very important: they changed only one player before the new season. So, they are the favorites in this match, but we believe in our abilities, we want to play good, hard, and we will try together with our suporters to be competitive in this match.”
∞∞∞ OTHER MATCHES ∞∞∞
Real Madrid travel to Anadolu Efes on Thursday with the Liga Endesa side aiming to bounce back from last week’s loss in Belgrade.
The two teams are separated by just two victories from second to eighth place. This will be the 25th meeting between them, with Madrid holding a 17-7 record to date in their series, including 13 wins to 3 for Efes this decade. They last faced each other in the 2015 playoffs, which Madrid won 3-1 en route to the EuroLeague title that season.
EA7 Milano host Zalgiris in the fashion capital as the Italian side aims to end the longest losing streak this season.
The hosts have dropped three home games in their ongoing seven-loss streak, but Zalgiris, which comes off a disappointing home loss itself, is their lowest-placed visitor in a while.
