BRA – Brazilian confidence grows each day

RIO DE JANEIRO (FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament for Men) – Brazil will travel to Greece this week feeling very confident that they can claim one of three spots available for the Beijing Games.

The South Americans are in Group A with Greece and Lebanon and before going into those clashes, they will take part in the Akropolis Tournament – a warm-up event for Athens.

High-scoring veteran Marcelinho Machado feels the Brazilians, who are missing several high-profile players like Leandro Barbosa, Anderson Varejao (injuries) and Nene (continued recovery from testicular cancer), are improving day by day.

"On offense, we are using spaces more and each player is positioning himself better, making it more difficult for our rivals,” he said.

“We are improving on team defense because that is key in order to not give away easy baskets.

“The Akropolis tournament will be a very good competition for us because we will face two rivals from the Pre-Olympic, Greece and Croatia, who we could meet in the semi-final round.

“The Greeks are playing at home with the support of their fans and have good and experienced players, but we will go out for the win.”

Brazil boss Moncho Monsalve, a Spaniard who was handed the national team reins in January, is also upbeat.

He has a very talented group that includes center Tiago Splitter, Marcelo Huertas, Marcelinho and Alex.

"Our aim is always to win,” Monsalve said.

“But our priority right now is the collective work on offense and defense.

“The team has been improving all the time since our first day of training and the players are giving their all with one aim in mind: to clinch a place at the Olympics.”

The final week of preparation, which includes games against the Greeks, Croatians and Australia, is vital for Monsalve and Brazil.

"Before we take on Lebanon in our first game of the Pre-Olympic tournament, we still need to polish certain details and these three games (Akropolis tournament) will be important, more so to give more international experience to players like Tavernari, Duda, Fulvio and Ricardo,” Monsalve said.

“In order to get good results, especially at the Pre-Olympic tournament,” the coach added, “it´s crucial that the team concedes (no more than) 72 to 78 points and gets 80 points."

FIBA