Before and during EuroBasket Slovenian colleagues and specialists told me EuroBasket would be held more peacefully if Serb fans did not arrive in Ljubljana. A lot of Serb fans attended the games of their national team till 18 September. But on 18 September, before, during and after the game against Spain the Slovenian police took additional measures of order and control. On that day about 2 000 Serb fans attended the game on “Arena Stozice”. Most of them arrived from Belgrade by buses, cars and plane. Before the game, the Serb fans made noise in the streets by dancing, singing, shouting, drums and other musical instruments. The Slovenian colleagues told me: You see, our fans are calmer than the Serbs…

Before the game, I met some Serb friends of mine. Somebody called me near “Arena Stozice”: “Georgia, Sokhumi”. They spoke in Russian too. They asked me to sit with them, to raise a flag of Georgia and to support their national team with my megaphone. I told them I would raise the flag for a while but the megaphone was not necessary. There were only 150-200 Spanish fans at the game. The Serb fans were very active during the game but the Spanish national team gained advantage from the beginning. The Serb fans were calmer in the second-third quarters. Some of them swore at the basketball players of their national team because they could not minimize the score. At the end of the game the Serbs abused their basketball players very loudly. I heard such swear only at the matches of “Shakhtar” Donetsk in 1970-1980s. I asked my Serb friends: “Did you expect that the Serbs would beat Spain? They answered: “Serbia has great basketball traditions and we must not lose to Spain by 30 points”. I said: “I understand you but does abuse work?” “2 000 fans have not arrived here to watch such shame!” – they answered…

The Serb fans are maximalists and are similar to Georgian fans… After losing to Spain, some Serbs returned to Serbia by buses. Some of them stayed in Ljubljana and attended another failed game of Serbia on 19 September. This time Serbia lost to Slovenia – 74:92. Before this game, the Slovenian police took additional measures of order. The Slovenian fans worried about Bozidar Maljkovic, Serb head coach of the Slovenian national team, how he would take the Slovenians against the Serbs. The game showed that Slovenia is better prepared than Serbia.

I finished working at EuroBasket and I am returning to Georgia. I wanted to stay till the final but I knew I would return to my homeland earlier. I said goodbye to my Slovenian colleagues in their native language: “Hvala! (thank you) and “Nasvidenje!” (goodbye)…

Tengiz Pachkoria, Ljubljana, specially for www.worldsport.ge

EuroBasket-2013 is presented by online bookmaker TBILISIBET.COM and Spanish sports clothing manufacturer Joma