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In defiance of Bertomeu, Žalgiris Kaunas fans sing on

December 28, 2011

In the spirit of ’11, BallinEurope’ll call it “Occupy Euroleague.” CEO Jordi Bertomeu made official a Euroleague decree at the start of the 2011-12 season which banned the performance of national anthems before games. (BiE kinda agrees with this dictum, actually, as most rosters are stocked with Europeans while clubs are owned/controlled by corporations and private interests.) Nevertheless, fans in Lithuania have taken it upon themselves to perform a little defiance in response.

Since opening day, hometown fans in Kaunas have sung the Lithuanian national anthem “Tautiška giesmė” a cappella (or should that be “le cappelle”?) prior to tipoff of Žalgiris games. This new tradition culminated in a particularly rousing rendition in the leadup to the must-win week 10 match against KK Zagreb. What does 15,000 fans willing their team to homeland-inspired victory sound like? Well, like this:

And if you don’t believe the Tautiška giesmė-as-fight song is the basketball fan’s equivalent of the Haka war dance, BiE can tell you his ears are still ringing from standing amid the locals belting it out preceding Eurobasket 2011 games…

Thanks to reader Augustinas for the tip!

Dec 28, 2011ballineurope
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This post was published on December 28, 2011
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Comments: 5
  1. 2 BiE
    11 years ago

    Ballineurope, you can update your article with the pic i posted. Zalgiris fans showing this during, after athem 😀

    http://g4.delfi.lt/images/pix/file51651981_fb27f47d.jpg

    ReplyCancel
  2. Basketball Courts
    11 years ago

    Why did they ban the national anthem before games? Looks like they all had fun anyway. lol

    ReplyCancel
  3. 2 Basketball Courts
    11 years ago

    It seems, that was mostly because of Spanish teams.. You know Baskonia, Catalonia..

    ReplyCancel
  4. Jaipur
    11 years ago

    fabulous post video really beautiful

    ReplyCancel
  5. sinai
    11 years ago

    In Tel Aviv Fans always sang the national anthem before Maccabi games. Even in finail four games the maccabi fans sing the national anthem.

    ReplyCancel
Pingbacks: 1
  1. BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site » Blog Archive » Message from Zalgiris Kaunas fans after national anthem rendition
    11 years ago

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ballineurope
11 years ago 6 Comments EuroLeague, Morebasketball fight songs, EuroBasket 2011, EuroLeague, Euroleague 2011-12, Jordi Bertomeu, KK Zagreb, Lithuania, Tautiske giesme, Zalgiris Kaunas
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BallinEurope.com was founded in September 2007 by Christophe Ney (who now runs the excellent scouting-themed website European Prospects) and Tobias Seitz, both then bloggers for FIBA.com with over 10 years’ worth of experience in the professional basketball world each. The mission then was to “provide a very unique perspective of Basketball in and about Europe.”
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