The likes of Lebron James and Kevin Durant might be interested in hearing some fighting words dispatched by German soccer coach Dieter Hecking last weekend.
Folks at the Deutscher Basketball Bund were aghast yesterday at the FC Nuremberg coach’s assessment that “This is a man’s sport; we’re not playing basketball.”
Commented the German federation’s Facebookers, “…it is sad and shows great ignorance that professional sports coaches [may make] untrue statements. But perhaps all is not lost for Mr. Hecking and we therefore make the following offer: We invite Mr. Hecking to a [BBL] or Euroleague game in Bamberg (so he doesn’t have to travel far). And then we will question him about his statement again. Or maybe common training times should be made for [soccer and basketball players]? This would be difficult, because footballers train only three times a week for 60 minutes…”
Shout out to BallinEurope contributing sportswriter David Hein of heinnews for the tip!
Tags: Deiter Hecking, FC Nuremberg, funny notes, Germany
I am a bit afraid of playing football ever since being 15-16 due to the level of contact I am used from basketball, unintentionaly turning into a football “lumberjack”.
Doesn’t even need to be an euroleague level game, just put him behing the basket so he’ll be able to witness the details
It’s an interesting statement, and I can understand where he is coming from in a sense. Soccer is a 90-minute grind with few interruptions in play, whereas basketball is 40 or 48 minutes of stop-and-go play with far more frequent breaks and substitutions.
If he’s talking about “toughness” rather than endurance though, well I won’t say it’s a German style of soccer, but part of the reason it’s hard for soccer to gain popularity in the US is because frankly a lot of people who watch the big international tournaments find the endless flopping to be unmanly and rather embarrassing to watch.
Looks like the great debate of this forum will be settled once and for all….is Vassilis Spanoulis good enough to play in the NBA or not?
Toronto Raptors said to want Vassilis Spanoulis. Greek media is talking about it and discussing the reactions from Raptors fans about that.
http://www.sport24.gr/Basket/OmadesBasket/A1Olympiakos/theloyn_spanoulh_oi_raptors.1943097.html
Okay good, Erik k, if only we can read the article. After all, it’s in Greek.
Nowadays people use what is called a Google translator
[...] some riffing on FC Nuremberg football coach Dieter Hecking’s, um, interesting comments of last weekend and the German basketball federation’s response; [...]