Bosnia and Herzegovina's ''coach who followed his heart'' set for a home debut v Czech Republic

SARAJEVO (FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 European Qualifiers) - In a scenario that few saw coming, Czech Republic could book their ticket to China on Sunday. But they need to slow down Jasmin Repesa's Bosnia and Herzegovina's (BiH).

BiH's newest playcaller had a tough debut, and a tough environment to make something happen, against a packed arena in Finland. However, he received praise for his decision to come back home in troubled times.

Repesa, born all the way in the south of BiH, in Capljina, made a name for himself in Croatian clubs and the Croatian national team, considering Croatia his homeland, too. But 57-year-old's roots were strong enough to make him take the BiH job, at least for these two games, while not taking a single penny for his time with the national team.

"Jasmin Repesa is the kind of coach European basketball needs the most. When basketball called for him, he answered the call, he followed the call of his heart," Finnish coach Henrik Dettmann said after defeating Repesa's BiH a couple of days ago.

The support of the home fans certainly helped Finland stay in front of the charging Dragons. And now, Zmajevi are set to enjoy their own piece of thunder from the stands. Sarajevo's Mirza Delibasic Arena was one of the loudest places we have seen in these Qualifiers.

"The last quarter against Finland showed us how we have to play. Aggressive defense, fast paced on offense. I am really sorry that we were really poor for 30 minutes against Finland, but compliments to my guys for showing the fight in them and not giving up," Repesa said after his first game in charge in over a year.

With Dzanan Musa and Jusuf Nurkic, he has got the commodity that former coach Dule Vujosevic could not enjoy. Vujosevic had to leave the bench due to his worrying health condition, but he will be the biggest supporter of the team when they take on Czech Republic.

A mighty Czech squad it is, too. A win for them in Sarajevo, combined with France taking down Finland, and Russia defeating Bulgaria - that's the recipe that could secure Czech Republic's place in the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 already on Sunday!

"We can be a great team, we have a lot of options in this team. We can play with two bigs, but I don't have a lot of time to work on this, and we can play with a lot of other options, so I hope we can make it (to the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019), and then we can practice normally, become a great team," coach Ronen Ginzburg said after his team's fabulous performance v Russia.

He knows that the atmosphere in the Skenderija, as they still call it in Sarajevo, will be electric.

"It's not an easy place to play in, with their NBA players and EuroLeague players, but we have enough time to prepare for this," Ginzburg added.

While the 6-1 Czech Republic are already checking flight schedules to Asia, Bosnia and Herzegovina know this is their last shot to make things interesting in Group K. They are at 2-5 right now, two wins behind Finland in the last seat on the airplane to China.

FIBA