Zhang Guan's breaking of the 1500-meter world record has become the focus of people's talk for a while, and Liu Feiren's retirement due to injury the day before has also been forgotten, and everyone has begun to look forward to Zhang Guan's next Olympic champion and the next world record.

On August 20, the Olympic Games entered the penultimate day of competition, and Zhang Guan had to deal with three matches on this day, the men's basketball team against Croatia in the afternoon, and the 800-meter middle-distance run heats and the 200-meter dash final in the evening.

The men's basketball team vs. Croatia was held at half past two in the afternoon, and since it had entered the knockout stage, the game was bound to be even more brutal.

The Croatian men's basketball team is a team with a glorious history, and the strongest period of the Croatian team was in the 90s of the last century, when the Croatian team made it all the way to the final of the Barcelona Olympics and finally lost to the American Dream Team of all time, and the Croatian star Poderovic even scored more points than the legendary superstar Michael Jordan. It can be said that in that era, the Croatian team was the only team that had the ability to compete with the Dream One team.

However, in recent years, the strength of the Croatian team has long been much weaker, and even in Europe, it can only be regarded as a mid-table team. In this Olympic Games, the Croatian team finally entered the main round of the Olympic Games by virtue of the defeat in the qualifying round.

According to the rules of Olympic basketball, there will be three places for the Olympic qualifying tournament, and all the teams participating in the qualifying tournament are mixed together, and the European team is in the same group as the African team and the Asian team, which is definitely an advantage for the European team. The three places that have not qualified for the Games are Greece, Croatia and Germany, all three of which are European teams. It is worth mentioning that Croatia once defeated Germany in the semi-finals.

The national team faced Croatia in the first round of the knockout round, and it can be said that a draw was drawn. In terms of strength, the Croatian team is similar to the Chinese team, but in terms of playing style and staffing, the Chinese team is obviously more restrained than the Croatian team.

Croatia has always been rich in tall point guards and tall interior lines, and Croatia's point guards are all traditional point guards, mainly organization-oriented; The Croatian team's inside line is also the traditional European kind of tall and large inside line, not fast, delicate technology, flexible movement, and average confrontation level. Overall, Croatia is a traditional European team that can't be more traditional.

Croatia's main point of attack is the inside line, as we all know, Da Yao is best at dealing with this traditional inside line, and the other two center forwards of the Chinese team are also very experienced in fighting against the traditional inside line, so the inside line of the national team has an advantage.

Another point is that the Croatian team is not fast, not because of the drag of the big center, but because the Croatian team really does not have fast players. The Croatian players are generally tall, and they don't have the dense muscles of black people, so it's normal to not run fast.

The speed of the national team is also not fast, especially when retreating, there are often defensive loopholes, facing a Croatian team that is not running fast, the two sides honestly play positional attack, which is obviously the most desired thing for the national team to play at home.

For the players of the national team, they have conducted a special study on every player of the Croatian team yesterday, and Zhang Guan did not prepare much for this game because he had to prepare for the track and field competition, and Coach Younas had to give Zhang Guan a small stove.

At this time, in the visual classroom of the men's basketball training ground, Coach Younas was explaining the situation of the Croatian team to Zhang Guan.

"This is Vukic, he is the only player in the Croatian team who will play in the NBA next season, the 24-year-old Vukic was drafted by the Raptors in 2005, but has been playing in the face of Spain, until the middle of last month, the Raptors announced that they signed a three-year contract with Vukic, probably to fill the vacancy after sending TJ Ford!"

Coach Younas pointed to a photo of Vukic and continued: "Vukic is 1.96 meters tall, he is a tall point guard, he is very good at the kind of cut-and-go layups of skill guards, and his arm span and lateral movement speed in defense can also put a lot of pressure on the opponent's family. ”

"Like Papalukas?" Zhang Guan asked.

Coach Younas thought for a moment, then shook his head: "Vukic's overall vision and passing awareness are far worse than Papalukas's, and his shooting level is relatively poor, and his dribbling speed is not very fast, I think with your defense, there should be no problem against him." ”

Zhang Guan nodded, and Coach Younas pointed to another person's photo and continued: "This is Pranić, also a point guard, 1.99 meters tall, taller than Vukic, he was drafted by the Nets in the first round 22 in 2003, and has played in the NBA for many years." His ball control and passing vision are great, but his speed is slow and his body is not very strong, and the speed point guard can easily break through him. I think with your speed, you can beat him on the offensive end. By the way, I have to remind you that Pranic has a good projection, so you have to pay attention when you play. ”

Coach Youanji pointed to another player's photo and continued: "This is Davor Kus, 1.92 meters tall, he is a two-way guard, he has good shooting ability, but his athletic talent is more average, he should be a substitute for the Croatian team." ”

"This player's name is Popovich, and he is the shortest player in the Croatian team, 1.85 meters tall, but he doesn't have the incredible speed of the average small point guard, and the Croatian coach probably won't send him on the court."

"That's probably the case with Croatia's back line, and there's another person you want to pay attention to, and his name is Thomas." Coach Younas pointed to Thomas's picture and continued: "He is 2.03 meters tall and plays small forward, but he has a very comprehensive skill set and a good sense of the big picture, and he has strong organizational skills, so sometimes he even runs to the point guard position." However, he is the same as the rest of the Croatian team, that is, the pace is average. ”

Zhang Guan nodded: "In general, the Croatian team is a team that can't run fast. ”

"You can understand that, but Croatia occasionally have fast breaks, but the speed of fast breaks is really not satisfactory. This is very beneficial to us. Coach Younas said with a smile.

……

At this time, in the Croatian team, Croatian coach Repesa is also encouraging his players.

'Boys, our opponent is China, which is good news for us because it means we have a chance of getting to the last four. If you look at the four teams in Group A, the United States, we can't beat them; Spain, we are no match for them either; Greece, we lost to them a month ago! Only the Chinese team is the object we can defeat! We want to defeat the Chinese team and advance to the semi-finals! (To be continued.) )