The Italy-US meeting will take place on Tuesday (September 5th) in the Philippines. The fight will start at 15.40 Kyiv time. The match will be broadcast live on Xsport TV channel.

It’s time to have fun at the Basketball World Cup. During this week the play-off stage of the world forum will be played and based on the results we will learn the name of the strongest team on the planet. Certainly all quarterfinal couples have intrigue. There is also the duel between Italy and the USA, where the main favorite of the tournament, who played very unevenly in their last match, on the contrary, found his game after an uncertain start and will fight against the national team. ready to fight a serious opponent.

Italy

Squadra Azzurra is not the best way to start the current tournament. Despite the starting win against Angola (81:67) and a close defeat to the formidable Dominican Republic (82:87), Gianmarco Pozzeco’s wards were not at all like a team that could go to the relegation matches. First of all, the accuracy of the Italian team’s shots was quite disappointing. So, in the first two games, the Apennines fired only 12 out of 60 long-range shots, and in modern basketball you can’t get very far without a good execution of the three-pointers.

Only after that, the team led by his influential mentor, Gianmarco Pozzeco, corrected his vision. In the third round match against the Philippines, the Italians scored 17 3-pointers (five points more than the last two games combined) and won 90:83, qualifying for the second group stage. However, the lack of the best basketball they showed in the first stage and Serbia and the Dominican Republic being one win behind did not make Italy the favorites in the quarterfinals.

Such predictions were confirmed until the middle of the third ten minutes of the opening match of the second round against the Serbs. In it, the Italians burned -14, and the fate of the meeting seemed to be determined. However, the fact that Simone Fontecchio and Luigi Datome took the floor later turned the game against the Balkans. Finishing basketball, Datome scored eight points in a row in the last minute of the third quarter, almost completely offsetting his team’s backlog, and Fontecchio’s prowess in the final game helped the Italians secure an important victory for them – 78:76 . After that, in the final round, Squadra Azzurra had to beat Puerto Rico in a lifetime match and did an excellent job beating their opponent by sixteen points (73:57).

The leader of the Italian team is Simone Fontecchio. The Utah Jazz forward leads his team in second place in points (18.4), performance (16.4) and rebounds (6.6). Also, you cannot pass the person of the coach. Gianmarco Pozzeco is by far the most extraordinary coach of the World Cup. A well-known player in the recent past is in constant and strong emotional contact with his players, standing behind them with a mountain and energizing his basketball players like a battery. Pozzeco literally lives every game of his team. Yes, he sometimes goes too far (he was removed from the bench in the Dominican Republic game), but Gianmarco does not leave anyone indifferent and draws attention to himself and his team like a magnet.

United States of America

The Americans started the tournament as the main favourites, and in the first group stage they did not have the slightest doubt about it. Three wins against New Zealand, Greece and Jordan, starting with a +103 total margin far from full rotation, only confirmed Steve Kerr’s team’s claim to the title.

But in the second round, there were unexpected problems in Stars and Stripes. At first, the best team of Montenegro drank enough blood from them, despite the final victory of the Americans in 85:73. And then the U.S. completely lost to Lithuania 104:110 while breaking its own anti-record. Never before had the founders of basketball conceded so many points in world championships. Hundred and ten!

It turned out that the main favorite had major problems in the three-second zone against well-trained teams in general. Thus, Steve Kerr’s team lost the fight over the shields to the Balkans (31:49) and the Lithuanians (27:43). And if the Americans had enough individual flair against Montenegro and enough sales percentage to win, they were sensationally the main favorite in the match against the Baltic states, who shot very good long-range shots (56%, 14 out of 25) that evening. loss.

At the end of the five games played, the clear leader of the USA is Anthony Edwards. The Minnesota guard averages 20.2 points per game, with an average performance score of 17.2. Either way, the best of the team. Interestingly, only three basketball players apart from Edwards average slightly more than ten points per game, but at the same time, seven basketball players on the team have a double-digit productivity rate at the same time.

***

Of course, the favorites of this confrontation are the Americans. But if we consider what the Italian team showed in the last two games and how the USA team played in the same period, we can no longer talk about the lack of potential for the European team. It will be very difficult for the players led by Gianmarco Pozzeco, but their dedication may well outweigh the individual standings of team USA, albeit with good luck. But Steve Kerr’s wards still have a much better chance of winning.

Sport.ua forecast: USA team won