Asvel knew that the task would be tough this Friday evening in his Astroballe, for his second consecutive Euroleague match at home and against a cador, Barcelona, finalist of the last edition. The players of TJ Parker, beaten on Tuesday by Real Madrid (74-87), fell on stronger than them.
FC Barcelona, better armed, manhandled and then knocked out Villeurbanne (80-60). In addition to a busy infirmary (Antoine Diot, David Lighty, Raymar Morgan, Victor Wembanyama), he had to deal at the last minute with two absent, Marcos Knight, who arrived last week as Lighty’s medical joker, and Dylan Osetkowski, positive for Covid-19 and in isolation for 14 days.
Asvel had an unbalanced start to the match, where the Spaniards quickly gained the upper hand, notably slamming a 10-0 (17-9) in the first quarter, before taking off with two three-point shots from the start of the second quarter (24-9, +15).
The Laprovittola festival
TJ Parker, the Villeurbanne coach, immediately reacted, reframing his players. And the rant paid off as Asvel broke down, in attack with Chris Jones and Kostas Antetokounmpo, author of a nice dunk to return to -1 (29-28) at 1 ‘from the break. The defense was also reorganized and Asvel returned to the locker room with only three lengths behind (28-31).
Only, in three minutes, Barcelona brutally resumed its march forward: three award-winning shots from Nikola Mirotic first, then the Argentinian Nicolas Laprovittola took over from afar. Elie Okobo (17 points) tried to stem the Catalan momentum, in vain (62-47, 30th). The Laprovittola festival (25 points, 7/12 to 3 points) continued in the last quarter (74-51, +23), while Asvel no longer had the means to keep up. .
At the microphone of the channel L’Équipe, Charles Kahudi spoke of the ” frustration From his teammates. ” In the second half, defensively we were on the street. Currently engaged in a series of four home matches, Asvel must now prepare for the last meeting on Sunday against Boulogne-Levallois, current leader of Betclic Élite.