From the Danish action thriller “He twisted his belly” for Grigonis: He didn’t want a forced vacation

When the Danes prepared their last attack, the Lithuanians risked not entering the final stage of the European Championship for the first time since 1993.

However, Mantas Kalnietis stopped the opponent, and Darius Maskoliūnas’ students breathed easier after winning 77:76.

As in the entire qualifying tournament, due to uncoordinated schedules, the Lithuanians competed in the most important match without the Euroleague players, except for the only Marek Blaževičius released for the national team.

So the former members of the Kaunas club national team spent a busy evening at their home websites.

Delphi When asked to share his impressions, M. Grigonis did not hide that the experiences were not the most pleasant.

“The last minute really made my belly roll, I wasn’t sitting on the couch anymore. I always support all my compatriots, from the headquarters of the coaches to the players. I’m glad there isn’t that free summer because you really don’t need it. Although I can still play basketball, I don’t want to have too many vacations. I am very happy for the coach, for all the players, for the return of Vaidas Kariniauskas. People will keep talking about how things were there, but in the end, it’s important that we get into the championship. And we’ll keep looking, a lot of work awaits us ”, said the defender.

But when asked if he wasn’t beginning to regret not helping the national team at the time, Grigonis shook his head.

“There was no such thought, because if I had been in the square, I wouldn’t know how I would have done it today,” laughed the leader of “Žalgiris”.

And it went well: M. Grigonis was the most productive (17 points) and most useful (24 points) player of the match with Crvena Zvezda.

Following the coronavirus outbreak, the Serbs, who had not yet returned to qualifying with five major players, fought fiercely in the first half of the match, but were unable to keep up after the break.

“I’ll see the statistics soon … Well, only 4 points were lost in the last quarter. Defend this game and we had to win. We came up with a reason to defend from the third half. We are starting badly, we have to change something”, commented M. Grigonis on the meeting.

– Would such quality of play be enough to expect a win in the next game against Real Madrid?

– Our game has always been to defend and run, taking light three-point shots. So far it has gone somewhere so the performance is poor. Would such a match in Madrid be enough? If we defended like in the last quarter, I think it would definitely be enough. But it won’t be easy: a different system, different players. It will be seen. We have a couple of days to prepare to start the game better, defend more aggressively, attack with more precision from afar. When we can run, we look so much better and we need to get it back in some way.

– You played for 36 minutes. – mainly during a career in the Euroleague. How do you feel if such a load is lifted?

– I played a lot not from a good life – Artūras Milaknis has problems, Lukas Lekavičius just returned to the lineup. Anyway, every basketball player wants to play as much as possible, as long as the body allows it. Although 36 min. it really looks a lot. Especially during the double week of the Euroleague.

– Now Žalgiris has a difficult schedule ahead of him. Does fatigue affect a game that, as you mentioned, is different from the one shown in the first half of the season?

– It is normal to feel tired at this time. There is always a physical well in the middle of the season, at least for me. But I don’t play for the first year, I know my body, I know what I need. Clearly, due to the virus, you now need to play every two to three days. What you will do, like I said, I can play it every day. As long as we are needed, as long as we give someone joy, it is better than sitting and crying.

We recall that the match with the representatives of Belgrade was supposed to take place in early February, but was postponed due to the coronavirus outbreak in the Serbian club. On Tuesday in Kaunas, Crvena Zvezda had only ten players: Corey Walden, Langston Hall, Duop Reath, Landry Nnok, Quino Colom were missing, as well as Johnny O’Bryant, who had already left the team due to the conflict with D. Radonjičius.

For his part, Lukas Lekavičius, who had not escaped the infection, returned to the ranks of the Žalgiris.

Kaunas won the first team match last October 75:69. The general history of mutual encounters in the Euroleague is also more favorable for Žalgiris – 8: 4.

Martin Schiller’s students will visit the Real Fortaleza in Madrid on Thursday, Crvena Zvezda will also travel to Spain and have a drink with Baskonia de Vitoria on Friday.