The crisis in the basketball department puts coach Roger Grimau under suspicion. However, sports director Juan Carlos Navarro wanted to defend as well as condemn the “attitudes that do not suit this club on and off the field”.
While the manager did not want to name the players who behaved badly, he expressed his full support to the coach who had six defeats in the last eight matches and had very bad days.
The fact that Willy Hernangómez, who played for only seven minutes against AS Monaco, was one of the players who could not perform as Grimau expected, creates a new source of tension in Palau. But he’s not the only one.
Classic with Madrid on day 3
Moreover, Madrid will arrive in the Euroleague next Wednesday, January 3 (21.00), and this will be the beginning of another four-game series in the Palau Blaugrana that will determine the future of the team.
The message Navarro gave on the last day of 2023 was quite effective. “It is a new project with many new faces after some changes we had to make,” said the sports manager of the Barça basketball department.
Hard hand in the locker room
“The first part of the season went very well, it was even above our expectations. Therefore, we showed that we can beat any team,” Navarro emphasized, and of course admitted: “There were defeats this December. There are things we need to change depending on the way the defeats occurred.”
“Roger Grimau is and remains our reference. There are things that have been discussed before and will not happen again”
He did not specify what these changes would consist of. “There are attitudes on and off the field that we do not like and that we do not deserve this club and this jersey,” Navarro said, thereby making the discomfort in the Palau dressing room public.
“There are things that will never happen again”
“There are things that have been discussed before and will not happen again,” he added energetically in a speech later published on Barça’s official media.
Grimau has no doubts. Or so Navarro claims. “Roger Grimau is and remains our reference,” said the division’s manager, in words directed not only to the fans but also to the inner world of the team. “He’s doing a great job and it’s not easy. We trust him, the project and the actors we have,” he said.