SER – Stars of tomorrow shine bright at Belgrade event

BELGRADE (Nike Junior Tournament) - The FMP Zeleznik junior team won the Nike Junior Tournament hosted by the club in Belgrade earlier this week.

The 1,500 spectators who attended the title game between FMP and Lietuvos Rytas Vilnius caught a glimpse of some of Europe's future stars.

FMP claimed a hard-fought 102-99 win.

The tournament hosted 12 of the best junior programs from around Europe.

Two tickets for the biggest juniors clubs event in Europe – the annual Euroleague Junior Tournament which is being held for the sixth year in a row during the Euroleague Final Four weekend – were up for grabs.

FMP Zeleznik, Red Star Belgrade, Partizan Belgrade, Hemofarm Vrsac, Montepaschi Siena, Benetton Treviso, Prokom Trefl Sopot, Bosna Sarajevo, Olimpija Ljubljana, Khimki Moscow, Fenerbahce Ulker Istanbul and Lietuvos Rytas Vilnius took part.

FMP had won a qualifying tournament held earlier this year in L'Hospitalet, Spain, where they took down the junior team of AXA FC Barcelona 79-78 in the final.

Having FMP in the final in Belgrade meant the third place game decided the second ticket to the grand tournament in Madrid at the start of May, and Red Star beat Hemofarm 92-83 to join FMP, Lieutuvos Rytas and Barcelona.

Two additional teams in the Final Four Junior tournament will be the hosting junior team of Real Madrid, the 2007 champs of Zalgiris Kaunas and two wild cards to be announced soon.

The MVP of the games in Belgrade was FMP power forward Bojan Subotic, who scored 17 points in the final and made some clutch plays on both ends of the court.

Joining him on the All Tournament team was his team-mate, center Dejan Musli, Partizan's duo Nemanja Jaramay and Aleksander Vlahovic, and Montepaschi forward Nika Metrevelli.

The tournament, which was held over three days, put some of the players on show that will be at the U18 European Championship this summer.

Serbia appear to have another skilled generation with Andreja Milutinovic, Nikola Vukasovic, Branislav Dekic, Uros Petrovic, Nemanja Nedovic and Lazar Radosavlijevic in addition to the All-Tournament four representatives.

Lietuvos Rytas were made up of players from several local clubs in Vilnius who only gathered two weeks before the competition and yet they showed the best team play, as well as a hard-nosed approach that brought them to within seconds of shocking FMP.

On that team, Evaldas Kairys, Rokas Jukonis, Devidas Nazarov, Augustus Peciukevicius, Mantas Kadzevicius and Osvaldas Martulinios all showed they could have big futures.

Two players who stood out in the tournament who did not reach the third place or title game were Prokom's Piotr Wojdyr and Benetton's Samuel Deguara.

Wojdyr is a thin, 2.17m center who led the competition in rebounding while Deguara, originally born in Malta, stands 2.23m in height and possesses a very large frame.

He'll turn 17 only in mid-June.

On the last day of the competition, Deguara had 16 points and seven rebounds with just one missed field goal.

Both prospects still have a long way to go before they can become professional ball players.

Among the other players who left their mark on the competition included Bosna's forward Aldin Majstorovic, who finished as the top scorer.

Olimpija's forward Dino Muric showed promising all-round skills while Benetton's Polish power forward Jakub Wojciejscowski also shone.

FIBA