Basketball World Cup, Pozzecco: “Without the staff I would have jumped from the 37th floor”

After the victory against the Philippines that brought Italy to the second phase of the World Cup, the Pozzecco show is broadcast on Sky Sport. The Azzurri coach alternates words of fire and strategic silences. And he takes a few pebbles off his shoes for the criticisms he received after his boys’ defeat against the Dominican Republic. “Get at me, but don’t say I’m harmful. Say that I lose matches. That I’m mad. Abnormal. But don’t touch my players. Don’t touch my staff. Don’t touch my federal president who has treated like a son, because he saw the suffering of a man. I dedicate this victory to him. They say that the coach is only one man, I’m not.”

“I would have jumped from…”

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“These guys won 11 out of 12 games. They won the world qualification, qualification for the European Championships. It was a complicated group but it is useless for me to explain it because many would not understand. We could discuss it. We have reached the Olympic goal. We have raised the bar. Keep on hitting me, don’t worry. I have a sensational staff, if it hadn’t been for my staff, I would have thrown myself off the thirty-seventh floor. When you are friends, you are friends for life”. Now under with the second phase, it will take a great Italy (and a great Poz) to keep dreaming.