Montenegro national team at the Fiba World Cup. FIBA PHOTO
Montenegro’s irate coach launched an extraordinary broadside at Fba Basketball World Cup match officials on Tuesday saying his side were “robbed” in a 93-83 defeat to New Zealand.
Zvezdan Mitrovic watched the second half of the defeat in the Chinese city of Nanjing away from the bench after being ejected for his second technical call.
The 49-year-old was still seething afterwards, telling reporters in the post-game press conference: “It’s very difficult to comment on basketball tonight. Very, very difficult.
“I watched the second half on television and it was a disaster.
“I hope somebody will make consequences about this refereeing tonight.”
Asked how his players — who have now lost both their matches in China — were feeling, Mitrovic thundered: “The guys feel like a robbery, like someone is stealing from you, they don’t feel they lost the game, they feel someone stole it.”
Montenegro, a country of just over 600,000 people, are making their Basketball World Cup debut and Mitrovic suggested that they were getting unfair treatment.
“We are a small country, I understand, first time at a World Cup. But you know guys, we need someone to respect us — just a little bit.”
Mitrovic was especially aggrieved about a “really crazy number of technical fouls in the second half”.
Asked to elaborate, he offered to show one reporter “50 or 60 situations on television in the hotel”.