Shay Shtriks: My obligation is to keep the image of the league

After it became clear that KK Mornar (Bar, MNE) will not play in EUROHOLD Balkan League, the managament took a decision about the competition system as there were three options for it. The Sports Director of the league - Mr. Shay Shtriks explained why Mornar will not be a part of the tournament in the new season and why they chose this kind of competition system:
 
This announcement comes due to the unpleasant situation we faced that KK Mornar - Bar, was taken out from the League after officially registering together with all the other teams. We understood they were not planning to make a competitive team and then in the last moment they decided they would not attend the official pre-season meeting which took place on 24.09.2013 in Sofia, Bulgaria. As a consequence, in the end of last week, they informed the League they could not build respective and competitive team and they were going to play most probably with their junior team.
 
My obligation as a Sports Director is to see the good of the league and the teams participating in the league. I can not ask a team to travel 500 km one direction to Bar and to play against a junior team. We can not send referees and pay money to officiate junior team. I can not pay to Mornar Bar to fly to Israel - flight costs around 8,000 EUR and the game to finish with big difference and not in a good level.
 My obligation is to keep the image of the league and of the teams which are serious and want to play.
The tough decision was to take KK Mornar Bar out of the league and we informed also the Montenegro Federation about this.
 
There were 3 options in front of us regarding the competition system:

• the easiest one - to continue the league with 2 groups of 5 teams and 4 teams with the same system.


• to find another team to replaceKKMornarBar in the last second and to keep the same system - 2 groups of 5 teams each one.


• the most difficult one - to change the structure of the league and to have league with 9 teams - additional 10 games and 1 more flight to Israel.

I decided to decline option 1 as to play one group with 5 teams and the other with 4 teams, we would put some of the teams in a very big disadvantage and this is not the way of the league. Option 2 can not be as in such a short notice we could not find a good team to replace KK Mornar Bar. To be on the safe side we checked during the weekend the option another team from Montenegro to be the replacement and few others from different countries but we could not find any good option.
 
I took decision to go for the 3^rd option. This is the option we were thinking to make next season and for sure if we check all the parameters this is the strongest and the best option.
 
There 9 teams which almost all of them are in the samevery good professional level.
 
There will be more games both on the Balkans and in Israel. That way will have at least 6 (six) additional derby games in 3 countries, the most important we will keep the same rounds, 18 and 2 Quarter Finals (teams 3-6 home and away)  which the 2 qualified teams will join to the first 2 teams that qualified automatic from spots 1 and 2 to the Final Four.
 
Each team will have minimum 16 games and some may have 18 without the Final Four, this is the reason why all the teams came to play in international league.
 
Changing the system now, the league will give the same possibility to all the teams to reach to the Final Four. All teams will play against each other until the end of the season and we will keep the balance of the competition and actually the competition will be stronger than ever.
 
I do confess it is a big challenge for us mainly financialy as we will have to cover 10 more games and 1 more flight to Israel. However, we in EUROHOLD Balkan League never run away form big challenges and I am sure that all the teams will support me and the league with this final decision.
 
All of us in the league are very excited but we are convinced about our decision and we know this season we are going to have a lot of great games in very good quality of basketball, much more interesting more fans and supporters.