Kosovo's first official basketball match ended in an emphatic 84-27 victory over Gibraltar, in the U16 European Championship Men Division C, in San Marino.
Selector of Kosovo U16, Chris Dial engaged all of the players in this match, who justified his trust in them from the first minute of the game until the last, showing good game and maximum focus.
Kosovo’s first scorer in the official competitions of FIBA was Ylldrit Sahiti.
After the match, Captain of Kosovo’s U16 NT, Dion Pllana said: “I am very happy and proud that we started with victory in the European Championship. We were very excited before and during the game, considering the fact that we are the first basketball players from Kosovo to play in the official competitions of FIBA since our affiliation to it. We transferred the pressure and the excitement into a team work and ended up winning our first game. However, we are not completely satisfied with this victory because we want more from this Championship; we want to win game after game. We have potential and we will prove it in the upcoming games against Monaco and Wales. Now we will completely focus in our Tuesday’s duel. We have a lot of work to do in this competition and we want to prove that we can play basketball and that Kosovo deserved to be a member of FIBA”.
Atik Koshi took the scoring honors with 16 points, while Etnik Peci added 14 points and Ylldrit Sahiti 10 points.
Kosovo NT U16 will play against Monaco on Tuesday, at 14:30. Today, Monaco was defeated by Wells 52:56.