CHN / LIB – Profligate Lebanon let China off the hook

TIANJIN (FIBA Asia Championship) - Last edition’s silver medalists Lebanon failed to convert the chances that came their way and went down 68-71 to an equally determined hosts China in a crucial Group F eight-final round game on Tuesday.

China, thus improved their record to 4-0 and will close their eight-final outings with a clash against another West Asian powerhouse Jordan on the morrow.

Lebanon are 2-2 and need a win against Kazakhstan on Wednesday to assure themselves of a quarterfinal place.

Lebanon outscored China 24-16 in the fourth quarter to come as close as two points, but Mat Freije’s attempt on the paint with about eight seconds left in the game bounced off the rim giving China the ball.

Lebanon’s rally thus failed to make amends for their earlier profligacy.

“We were really reckless in the fourth quarter and almost lost it,” China coach Guo Shiqiang.

“I think we missed far too many chances early in the game,” Lebanon coach Dragan Raca said.

Lebanon were certainly far more tactical and displayed much better coordination in their plays.

Where they failed to seize the initiative was in scoring. China got lesser opportunities – in all forms – to score, but converted a better part of them.

“We had our plan nicely worked out, just that it didn’t reach its logical conclusion,” Raca said.

China converted 28 of their 55 field chances as against Lebanon’s 26 out of 71. China returned a 57% record in two-pointers (24/42) while Lebanon struggled at 38% (21/56).

Lebanon sank four of their five three-pointers for the game, in a total 15 attempts, in the fourth quarter, but that improvement in scoring rate seemed to have come too little a little late.

That was the tale of the Lebanese bid to beat the hosts, in vain.

China, grew in confidence gleefully accepting a increasingly fumbling and faltering rivals and the resultant growth in the scoreboard improved China’s head-to-head record against Lebanon to 7-0 in FIBA Asia Championships.

Mat Freije raised hopes a Lebanese fightback firing in 11 of his 22 points in the third quarter, but that was inadequate against the Chinese teamwork in scoring.

Guo Shiqiang used 10 of his players and eight of them scored.

“I guess this was the toughest game we faced so far. But as we move ahead it’ll only get tougher. In a way it’s nice to win these tough battles,” Shiqiang said.

Jackson Vroman had a game-high 25 points, but converting only 10 of his 25 field attempts.

Yi Jianlian, Jackson’s Chinese counterpart, returned a 69% field record (9/13) for his 19 points.

Zhu Fangyu also scored 19, 11 of them in the fourth quarter to keep China ahead against the late Lebanese rally.


S Mageshwaran
FIBA Asia

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