"We made too many defensive mistakes": Popovic and Akhmedov on the second game for bronze

Zenit-2 head coach Oliver Popovic summed up the second game of the bronze medal series in the Fonbet Super League. The away game ended with a 101:85 victory for Khimki.

The guys didn’t play any defense today. We allowed 101 points, and Khimki’s two-point shooting percentage was very high — nearly 70%. They also shot over 40% from beyond the arc. We played without defense, giving up about 25 points per quarter on average. Congratulations to our opponents — they fully deserved the win today. We made too many defensive mistakes.

The captain of the blue-whites team Elkhan Akhmedov also commented on the result of the match.

We lost every battle and gave them easy points — that’s how the score turned out the way it did. It’s hard to win when you allow that many points. A lineup change compared to the first game? Some of the guys were a bit tired from playing in the youth league, and Aksenov played with a minor injury. Now we’re looking forward to the game in St. Petersburg — we’ll keep fighting.