The Road To
Gold For Cyprus Men's Basketball Team
NICOSIA, 5 June 2009 -
The Cyprus Men's National team continued
their unbeaten run in the Men's Basketball tournament of
the XIII Games of the Small States of Europe. The Cyprus
team beat Malta 69-55, Friday, and with a record of 4-0
they only need to win the game against Andorra on
Saturday, in the so-called 'final' of the Basketball
tournament.
Andorra beat Luxemburg on Friday with
97-95, improved their record to 3-1, and they will take
the gold home if they beat Cyprus on Saturday.
Cyprus may win the gold medal even if
they lose to Andorra, as long as Iceland beats
Luxemburg. In such a case, we will have a triple tie on
the bottom of the table, and Cyprus will prevail on
first place.
An interesting fact: Cyprus and Andorra
played in the final of the GSSE in Nicosia in 1989, a
match the small Pyrenees country won by just two points
difference. The Cypriots complained about the refereeing
in that game, a match today’s Cyprus coach Christos
Stylianidis participated as a player. Of course on
Saturday he will seek to win the gold medal he lost in
that competition.
As far as the Cyprus-Malta game, the
final score practically flatters the Maltese. The home
team took a stormy start and claimed a 23-0 lead, before
Malta scored their first basket of the game!
In the second half, the Cypriot team
played loosely and saved energy ahead of the Andorra
game. A fact Malta used and after improving at offence
and defense, managed to cut the margin.
Quarters: 28-7, 18-8,
14-21, 9-19.
CYPRUS (Stylianidis):
Pantouris 4, Neofytou 11, Koronides 6, Trisokkas 13,
Garcia 9, Giannas, Anastasiadis 3, Kounnas 3, Liatsos 3,
Palalas 5, Kaskiris 7, Theocharides 5.
MALTA (Di Pietro): Naudi 12, S. Schembri 3, Bonnici 6,
Said 6, D. Schembri, Shoults, Baldachinno 12, Matijevic
9, Cassar 7.
