Will FC Barcelona be able to win at Fenerbahce?
FC Barcelona visits Fenerbahce this Friday in matchday 28 of the Euroleague in Ulker Sports And Event Hall.
The Turkish team is in 5th place with 16 wins and 10 defeats which came after Wednesday’s defeat in Israel against Maccabi 78-74. Dimitris Itoudis declared after the match that the biggest dissatisfaction was the offensive part where they had problems, especially at the end. Hayes had 16 points, Pierre 15 points and Motley 12 points. Fenerbahce had 2 new players for this match, Bjelica returned with 6 points and 4 rebounds in 9 minutes, and Tyler Dorsey made his debut, playing 4 minutes. Probably in the match against FC Barcelona both will get more minutes and their contribution will be better. The average points of the team this season is 84.8 points and they have a lot of solutions: Hayes, Pierre, Motley, Wilbekin Calathes, Guduric, and the newcomer Tyler Dorsey.
Barcelona, unlike Fenerbahce, played in Greece on Tuesday, so they should be more rested with an extra day off. Their record is 18-9, one win behind Olympiakos and Real Madrid. Until the match in Greece, they had a series of 5 consecutive victories in the Euroleague, a series stopped by the bad offensive match made against the Greeks 77-70. Nikola Mirotic finished the game with 19 points, Laprovittola 15 points and Sanli 13 points. The 2 consecutive defeats force the Spaniards to raise the level of the game and restore the series of victories. The first match was won by the Catalan squad 81-80 in a duel between Laprovittola 26 points versus Motley 23 points, Mirotic missing in that match.
We will have a battle in which we will see 2 teams that come after less successful matches on the offensive side, although both score an average of over 80 points per game. The question is whether Barcelona will be able to take advantage of the extra break day they had.
Valentin Petruta
Photo credit: EuroLeague