Preparation of the national basketball team for Latvia and Belgium began with George Papas

The men’s national team began preparation for the two FIBA ​​”window” games against Latvia and Belgium for the 2023 World Cup qualifiers on Monday, November 7th. The first training session ended with sixteen (16) athletes and not fourteen (14) as announced a few days ago.

George Papas is among those who have already trained under the tutelage of Sotiris Manolopoulos. The expatriate Olympiacos guard is the first player in the EuroLeague to contribute to the 2/2 success in these qualifiers. Leonidas Kaselakis, on the other hand, is not quite fit after his injury.

Giorgos Tanoulis and Stelios Poulianitis will also play a supporting role in the preparation.

In the coming days it will be known who (and when) from the remaining players competing in the EuroLeague will strengthen the “blue and white” in this “window”. However, Partizan’s stance on the Yam Madar issue is not just a happy omen as far as the presence of Ioannis Papapetrou in the two games is concerned.

The training sessions will take place under the guidance of Sotiris Manolopoulos and his partners Savvas Kamberidis, Stefanos Triantafyllos and Marios Batis.

The men’s national team schedule includes two more days of training at OAKA, with the team traveling to Crete on Wednesday 9 November. The day after the game against Latvia (Saturday 12 November), the men’s national team return to their base for a training session before boarding the plane again, this time to Belgium where they will play another crucial game on Monday 14 November game will contest.