Tofaş GM on BCL move: “Eurocup was not sustainable”

Tolga Öngören, the GM of TOFAŞ Sports Club, spoke to TrendBasket about the club’s decision to participate in next season’s Basketball Champions League, although they had a granted spot in EuroCup.

“The EuroCup format started to be a burden on the clubs. The only goal of a Turkish team in EuroCup is to be able to play in the EuroLeague. Even though you became a champion in Turkey, you can not go to the Euroleague. The finalist and champions in EuroCup are the only one to go to EuroLeague. And per the rules, you should stay in the playoff stage in your first season in EuroLeague to keep your license and continue to a part of the competition. We did not find it sustainable.”

“The financial and sporting moves of the Basketball Champions League in the last two years are important. Prestigious teams of Europe are also participating. Other Turkish clubs also joined BCL and there will be other teams to join from Europe. We think that the organizational and functional structure of BCL is higher than EuroCup.

The Basketball Champions League can rival the EuroLeague in a few years. When we look at their investors, they are stronger than EuroCup. EuroCup is a door for the EuroLeague, but the conditions offered by the Champions League are more attractive.

The special request of the Champions League from us was that the terms of the agreement were not disclosed. We did not elaborate in our press release regarding the agreement of these two institutions. However, I can say that: our agreement is more advantageous than EuroCup.

We are TOFAŞ Sports Club. We have a very serious structure. One part of our job is asking opinions from the technical team. We also received the support of Orhun Ene, our head coach. We also talked to some of our players. We held the necessary negotiations and reached this decision. I do not think that the transition will affect the staff or squad negatively. TOFAŞ Sports Club stands in an important place in Europe with its structure and organizational vision. The decision of an institution like TOFAŞ shows respect for the Basketball Champions League. I don’t think it will be a negative situation for the players. Maybe we could bring a Final Four to Turkey…”