LIT – Lithuania wild about ticket to Turkey

Lithuania’s Mindaugas Balciunas: ‘Our fans will create great celebration’ - Watch the interview

ISTANBUL (2010 FIBA World Championship) – If Lithuanian basketball fans were depressed over their team’s poor showing at the EuroBasket in Poland, they’ll be jumping for joy now.
 
The Baltic country on Saturday received a wild card to play at the FIBA World Championship in Turkey and the secretary general of the Lithuanian Basketball Federation, Mindaugas Balciunas, travelled to Istanbul to hear the announcement.
 
“We really feel very happy,” he said to FIBA.com.
 
“All of Lithuania is happy. We’re grateful for being given the chance. I’m happy that everyone understood that we deserved to be there.”
 
Balciunas revealed that already, his country’s passionate basketball supporters were making plans to attend next year’s big event.
 
“I know that up to 4,000 fans have already announced they will travel along with the team to Turkey,” he said.
 
“They will create a great celebration.”
 
Lithuania have been a huge story in the basketball world for a very long time.
 
They won gold medals at the EuroBaskets in 1937 and 39, and had star players in many of the awesome Soviet Union teams in the decades that followed, including Arvydas Sabonis, Sarunas Marciulionis and Rimas Kurtinaitis – three starters on the gold-medal winning 1988 Olympic team.
 
Lithuania claimed bronze at the 1992, ’96 and 2000 Olympics, gold at EuroBasket 2003 and bronze at EuroBasket 2007.
 
This year in Poland, Lithuania won once and lost five to crash out of the EuroBasket before the Quarter-Finals.
 
The dismal showing led to the departure of Ramunas Butautas, and left the country needing a wild card to play in Turkey.
 
“Every team, even the best teams, face troubles and hard times,” Balciunas said.
 
“The most important thing is to believe in the future. We’re happy that FIBA believed in us. We believe in our basketball, our players and I’m sure that we will show a different team in the World Championship.
 
“After that, we have EuroBasket 2011 in Lithuania. We’ll do our best, I’m sure about  that.”
 
Had Balciunas feared that his country may not receive a wild card?
 
“All of Lithuania was very nervous,” he said.
 
“I’m very happy we were successful.”
 
How long will that happiness last?
 
“Until the first game of the World  Championship, we’ll be celebrating,” he said.
 
FIBA