Day 15 is complete. A long first, full day in Serbia.
Early wakeup and breakfast at 8:30. Interesting selections. Some nice breads, scrambled eggs, mixed veggies (yep carrots, broccoli, cauliflower and bacon), lots of meat and cheese (many different very tasty cheeses), french toast (or as close as it could get) and hot dogs as expected LOL. But then I tried an absolute first for breakfast. Fish Sticks. I had to try one and it wasn't bad.
After breakfast we had a team meeting to review some video and the girls had to present some ideas from the film they watched. We had a little break afterward and then walked to our shooting practice for 12noon. The practice was OK but lacked a little bit of concentration. We reviewed some defensive stuff and tried to tidy up our offense.
Afterwards we walked back to the hotel. It was a beautiful sunny day here in Belgrade. It started out with a very nice cool breeze and then that died out. It became nice and warm. Not too hot. Kind of a Goldilocks day - Just Right.
We came back to lunch and it was good. They serve you a number of courses here. The first one at lunch was a very nice creamy vegetable soup with beef. Very tasty and their bread is fantastic with it. The next course was a plate with rice, steak, green beans and boiled potatoes. Very tasty as well. So far so good. Lastly, and a perfect ending, was a beautiful "custardy" type of dessert with chocolate sauce and whip cream. Brought the meal to an end nicely.
After lunch we decided to go for a short walk down the street. There was a few stands set up with people selling all kinds of things and there were a few older women selling vegetables. Some beautiful looking green onions, beans and one women had beans pickled in a 500ml plastic coke bottle. Quite interesting. Would have been nice to sample a few things.
We decided to head to nice little grocery store next to the hotel. There is no way to tell that there is a grocery store there. It just looks like a little building. I went in and spent some time roaming around. Interesting stuff for sure. Lots of fresh produce and the butcher was working away behind the counter. The most interesting thing he had was probably the young pig that was in his display case - the head was off but it was there sitting beside it. I picked up a chocolate bar that I had when I was here before that you cannot get in Canada and a few other things.
Headed back to the hotel after that to take care of some emails and tried to relax. I had time to do some hand laundry as I have grown accustomed to on a trip like this. Amazing the amount of laundry you can do in a sink. LOL. I grabbed a quick shower and got ready to go to the first game. I headed up the street at 5:10pm for the 5:30 start. I watched Italy and Montenegro as we play Montenegro tomorrow. It was a very good game and EXTREMELY physical. Italy won down the stretch with some good shooting. I am a little familiar with Montenegro as we played them last year so I was able to note some of their tendencies from memory.
Our game was scheduled for an 8pm tip off and I think we showed up around 9:15. It may have been the absolute UGLIEST game I have ever seen. We were bad on offense and worse on defense. We committed 28 turnovers which is disgusting. Somehow we were alway within striking distance (probably because they didn't hit their wide open shots) and we started to play a little bit in the last 6-7 minutes. We edged up 59-57 and managed to hold on for the win. It was a relief to win but it felt bad to do it the way we did it. One of those games where you win and are thoroughly disappointed. We have time to get better though and tomorrow will give us that opportunity.
It was a nice cool walk on the way home and we headed right for our late dinner. First course was a beautiful tomato and cheese salad. Perfect start. Then it was a small pasta dish followed by chicken and french fries. An orange for dessert and we were on the way.
One final meeting with the staff to discuss game planning and review the game clips for Montenegro and that took us past midnight. Tomorrow we will have breakfast, practice and then a video session before the game vs Montenegro. Another full day.
So now it is almost 1AM. Sleep is calling.
Until tomorrow.......
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