EUROBASKET 2011

Elmedin Kikanovic was outstanding for Bosnia and Herzegovina, but he will need Mirza Teletovic to step up and share the burden against Montenegro

Bosnia and Herzegovina v Montenegro - Thursday at 15:30 (14:30 CET)

Bosnia and Herzegovina coach Sabit Hadzic is expecting another tough assignment when his team face Montenegro as they look to bounce back from their opening day loss to Greece.

The play-caller had mixed emotions after an opening display which for long periods offered the promise of a potential upset before finally going down 76-67.

"We did a good job on defence but we could not keep this up for the whole game," explained Hadzic.

"I am also hoping our shooting will be better to give us a chance to win some games.

"Greece, Croatia and Montenegro are the toughest teams in our group. Montenegro showed their strength in qualification and we will have to find a way to win."

Certainly it's unlikely Mirza Teletovic will shoot the ball as poorly as he did against the Greeks on what was a rare off-night for the influential star and with a potential backlash in the offing, Montenegro will have to shut him down on the perimeter.

Having shown great composure and a strong mentality to grind out out a valuable debut victory in overtime against F.Y.R. of Macedonia, Montenegro can also take added heart that they did it without a huge scoring game from their marquee player Nikola Pekovic.

With 50 of their 70 points all coming from their big guys, Bosnia and Herzegovina have a big task in containing and coping with the depth of the Montenegrin frontcourt and this is likely to be key.

Finland v Greece - Thursday at 18:00 (17:00 CET)

Greece coach Ilias Zouros won't be taking Finland lightly and believes his team need to pick up their concentration levels after an unconvincing opening game, with the victory only being sealed in the final quarter.

"In this group you have to respect everybody because everybody can win any game. I don't think we were concentrated enough in the first half against Bosnia and Herzegovina," Zouros admitted.

"We have to be very serious against Finland as they are a really dangerous team who shoot the ball a lot."

Finland gave Croatia an almighty fright with some great perimeter shooting before finally being edged out 84-79, not only because the Croatians possessed a true game winner in Bojan Bogdanovic but also because of their inability to convert inside - a fact not lost on Finland coach Henrik Dettmann.

"This was a big problem for us but at least we managed to score some baskets inside near the end of the game and maybe this can give us some confidence," he said.

"The Finnish team was never going to be one of the tallest in the tournament. We have to rely on being mobile, smart and showing effort which I think we did a lot against Croatia."

F.Y.R. of Macedonia v Croatia - Thursday at 21:00 (20:00 CET)

After difficult opening games which both went down to the wire, F.Y.R. of Macedonia and Croatia may have had different outcomes but the pressure will be on both to find a victory on day two.

While the former will be ruing a missed opportunity against Montenegro and no doubt eager to make amends and rack up that precious first success, Croatia were far from slick against Finland.

They can't rely on being bailed out by individual players like Bogdanovic and an improvement will be required.

Especially against a team who can match up far better inside with the likes of Pero Antic and Predrag Samardziski likely to take it to the Croatians under the hoop.