A tense but important victory. Ukraine beat Iceland in World Cup qualifiers

On Monday, November 14, the 2023 World Cup qualifying match took place, where the Ukrainian team faced the Icelandic team. Ainars Bagatskis’ team took a tense but important win.

Ainars Bagatski’s men need to win two more games and one has to hope that the main rivals (Iceland and Georgia) in the fight for third place will not win more than three games….

… In the match against Iceland, the Ukrainians had no right to make a mistake. However, this only concerned the final outcome of the fight, as a defeat could put an end to the team’s desire to enter the final division of the World Championship. Apparently, this is why Bagatskis’ men decided to make a lot of mistakes throughout the match.

In that first quarter of the meeting, the second Ukrainian basketball players caught up with rivals mainly from Scandinavia. However, the situation changed in the last minutes of the first half of the match. The resulting turning point allowed the Ukrainian team to take a long break with a two-point advantage – 35:33.

The Ukrainians’ game right before the others gave reason to believe that they could still reach a fundamental milestone in the third quarter and lead the game and not be led. Unfortunately. As with most of the previous match, they again caught more.

But everything changed in the fourth 10-minute period, which was an excellent achievement for Ainars Bagatskis’ team. At the end of the attacks, the ball finally began to obey the Ukrainians, and there was more efficiency in the team’s moves than misses and failures. As a result, in the final seconds, the Ukrainians got a handicap of 10 points (78:68), which allowed them to win by seven points – 79:72.

2023 World Cup qualifiers. Second stage. L Group

Ukraine – Iceland – 79:72 (14:18, 21:15, 16:20, 28:19)

Ukraine: Lipovy (16 + 4 rebounds), Kravtsov (13 + 6 rebounds), Krutous (13), Lukashov (10 + 6 assists), Sidorov (8 + 4 assists), Gerun (6 + 10 rebounds), Tkachenko (6 + 10 ) rebound), Tyrtyshnik (3), Bobrov (2), Voinalovich (2).

Iceland: Steinarsson (6), Gudmundsson (14), Friedriksen (10), Glynason (24 + 13 rebounds), Trastarson (7) – start; Jonsson (2), Bjornsson (3), Akox (4), Viljalmsson (2).

Arena Riga (Riga, Latvia)

UKRAINE – ICELAND. TEXT BROADCAST OF THE MATCH