New attendance record in sight in the French basketball championship: Nanterre, which welcomes Asvel on Sunday in front of more than 16,000 spectators, is positioned in the competition between the clubs of Île-de-France, where an audience is at conquer.
Five years after having gathered 15,228 people at La Défense Arena in Paris, then brand new, the Hauts-de-Seine club is renewing the experience against the same opponent, pushing the gauge a little further: around 16,300 should be massed in the stands Sunday (5:00 p.m.) according to its leaders, an attendance never before reached for a match in the French championship.
“It’s a huge message and a real satisfaction for the club to bring together more than 16,000 people for a regular season match,” said AFP Frédéric Donnadieu, president of the club, before the 23rd day of Elite.
This record attendance once again testifies to the presence of a passionate basketball public in the capital, less than two months after the NBA’s remarkable visit to Paris, where Chicago and Detroit filled the stands at Bercy.
“It responds to a request”, confirms Frédéric Donnadieu, delighted to see his team face a Euroleague formation in front of so many people, while his usual lair, the Maurice-Thorez Sports Palace, located less than two kilometers from the ‘Arena, has only 3,000 seats.
Enough to reinforce its status in a championship which now has three Ile-de-France clubs, with Boulogne-Levallois, carried by its star in the making Victor Wembanyama, leaving for the NBA at the end of the season, and Paris Basket, a young wolf with long teeth. But these projects have “nothing to do” according to the Nantes leader.
– “Authentic club” –
“We position ourselves as an authentic club, we claim it: we are historic, very stable, and we have won a lot of titles”, he assures.
“We are not a club with announcements, I could tell you that after this match at the Arena we are aiming for the Euroleague within three years to play there, but I know very well that it is not financially unsustainable,” he continued.
Words that echo the ambitions of Paris Basket, born in 2018 and which is preparing, while eyeing the Euroleague, to leave the old Georges-Carpentier hall for the brand new Adidas Arena (8,000 seats), built for the Games in the north of the capital.
Frédéric Donnadieu, however, denies responding to the recent relocation of his neighbor’s matches to Roland-Garros and Bercy: “We really don’t do this in reaction to others, we do it for us and because we want to. “, he explains, adding that in “2018, we were the first, we already did not need the others”.
The Greens intend to stand out thanks to the spectacular aspect of the proposed “show”, in an enclosure which will host the swimming events during the Paris Games, and where they will therefore not be able to return in 2024.
The players crowned champions of France in 2013 will be celebrated on Sunday, in the midst of pyrotechnic demonstrations, laser animations and concerts by rappers Naza and Gaulois.
The Nantes boss, son of the former president and brother of coach Pascal Donnadieu, hopes for the same outcome as in 2018, when Nanterre won by one point after a breathless end to the match. This scenario would be good for the team because it is struggling to maintain, stuck in 15th place.
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