There are two games to prepare for Edilnol before the start of the first away match in the league. While the team thinks of Trapani, the opponent of the debut in A2, aware of having to get by without Tj Cromer, the general manager Damiano Olla and the coach Andrea Zanchi have their eyes open on the market to find the replacement of the American guard, moving between the narrow stakes of tight deadlines, cash on hand that does not allow millionaire hits and the needs of a group that needs a scorer, but also a leader capable of helping young people. The first list of names drawn up by Olla included many candidates, including players who have already known the Italian and European reality and others who would instead have their first experience on this side of the ocean. But the preferred way is to find someone as similar as possible to Cromer, who arrived in Italy with a positive season in Udine and with an encyclopedic knowledge of the A2 series that amazed the rossoblù staff.
On paper, a ready one is better, in short, with a talent perhaps with greater potential to get used to our local basketball as you go: a team that needs to grow quickly can do it more easily if it has some certainty. And the impact of Steven Davis, new to Italy, but already used to the championships in Europe, is one more testimony of how this can be the main road. Damiano Olla spoke to President Trada and the rest of the executives on Tuesday evening, a few hours after Cromer’s farewell was officially announced. And since that meeting, the list of eligible candidates for the role of foreign holder of Edilnol has thinned: “There are three or four names left,” says the general manager without unbuttoning himself. We can therefore make simple assumptions: among the players in the role of play-guard seen in Italy in the past Serie A2, those still without a contract are very few. There is Kenny Hasbrouck, for example, back in Ferrara for a year, former partner of Luca Infante in Piacenza and already protagonist of the promotion of Fortitudo Bologna in 2018/2019. On paper, he might like it more than another free A2 former ex like Jordan Floyd, a forward-doc last year in Capo d’Orlando. But the agents of the players still without a contract have certainly opened the sticker album under the eyes of the rossoblùs, indicating the profiles of those who are experienced and have already tried life in Europe. Choosing quickly and well in any case will not be enough to add an American to the group who will leave for Sicily on Saturday at lunchtime: he will lead Captain Infante with the help of Pollone, he will make his debut after the injury Bianchi and Davis will be asked even more in attack. Meanwhile, Tommaso Lanzi found a home in Serie B a few days after the end of his time agreement with Biella who had kept him to increase the squad: at the weekend he will make his debut with Bernareggio.