Azzurre Edge Towards Quarter-Finals

"It was a good game because we came out aggressive" -  Nnena Wabara

By Paul Nilsen

Turning Point: With the contest tied at 20 after a real war of attrition during the first half, Slovak Republic came back onto the floor after the break, but left their game in the locker room. Italy took full advantage with a devastating 18-4 spurt of scoring and Slovakia couldn't recover.

Stats Don't Lie: A total of 26 turnovers was a particularly disastrous statistic for Slovak Republic.

Game Heroes: Giorgia Sottana top scored with 22 points, but it was her backcourt colleagues who gave valuable support, with two essential cameo contributions from Giulia Gatti and Francesca Dotto.

A scorching start to the second half proved to be a launch-pad for Italy to take a 58-47 second round win against a misfiring Slovak Republic, as the Azzurre gave their EuroBasket Women 2013 quarter-final prospects a real shot in the arm.

In a game that was all about the result, rather than the slickness of the performance, Nnena Wabara was just relieved to have come out on top, claiming defence was behind the victory.

"It was a good game, because we came out aggressive," said the veteran forward.

"We knew that we needed to take this game to regain confidence after our loss against Turkey.

"We were on the same page on defence, which helped us with offence.

"This win also gives us some confidence for the next game against Montenegro."

Both teams struggled to find any kind of offensive rhythm in a first-half which was intense but error-strewn.

Despite a rapid-fire 8-2 start, Italy spilled the ball ten times in the first 11 minutes which helped Slovak Republic get back on a level footing at 14.

Whilst Gatti restored their advantage from three-point range, the first triple of the game for either team, it was locked by the interval.

But, when the action resumed, Italy made their move and broke the game open with a stunning few minutes as Slovakia went into meltdown and could only scrape nine points in ten minutes.

Once Italy established their double-figure lead, it always looked to be too much of a gap for Slovakia to make up and so it proved.

Quotes Italy vs. Slovak Republic

Slovakia Head Coach Ivan Vojtko:
"Congratulations to the Italian team. We tried to recover after the game against Spain; we didn't start very well but we fought and in the first half it was a tough game. Then, in the third quarter we couldn't play well. We played a very good defence but, at this level, it was not enough. We didn't score; we missed a lot of shots. The problem was not our defence, it was our offence."

Italy Player Nnena Wabara:
"It was a very good game, we came out very aggressive and we were very competitive. Today we got a lot of confidence for our next game."

Italy Head Coach Roberto Ricchini:
"It is a very important win for us because we beat a very good team, they had three fantastic games in Vannes and they showed they are a very competitive team. Today it was a very balanced game but our aggressiveness on defence let us break the game in the third quarter. Now we have a lot of confidence and we only have to improve our fluency on offence."