Translated from this post

" We don't want to stop here "

Today (Sunday) we had video on Croatia at noon. I woke up at ten to noon. I've slept for a long time. But it's ok, it was happening at the hotel, I was on time. We have seen that the Croats had a strange game : they have real players but they don't really play collective anyway. So it's the kind of team you can't predict. You never know with them. Especially since they're struggling for the qualification.

So for us the objectives were as usual, we have to impose our game right away. There are so many good players in this team I can't tell we targetted someone in particular. And even though they don't really play collective, they've started the game well. They attacked well the inside, Ronny [Turiaf] took some fouls and we were forced to play small then. That's why we've struggled inside. 48 points against us at half time, it sucks a bit, especially since we were averaging 59 points against us per game.

But unlike the previous games, we've managed to survive thanks to our attack. We're starting to have a nice address and gain confidence in our shooting. We're better than in first round. It's a lot of things. The arena is better, the pressure is rising. We're feeling there's more at stake so the preparation, confidence and a lot of aspects are different from the first round. We're more precise and the ball is moving better, Bobo [Diaw] scores 3 pointers, Tony [Parker] is more and more implicated, Flo [Pietrus] is fine, Nando [De Colo] does great things, Ali [Traoré] does his job, everybody has stepped up. Starting with Tony. He made two, three, very classy plays. His penetration where he goes through 2 players, draws the contact of a big guy, reverse and finishes on someone I don't remember, it's great classy.

However in the 3rd quarter we've stepped up our defense. We were " Now, it's enough ". We've completely stopped them, even though Popovic scored his points. In a pinch that's fine : go and score your points as long as the others don't score, we don't care. He scored his 30 pts but the others didn't score.

And even when they switched to zone, we broke it right away. First play Boris puts a 3 pointer. Next play he passes to Flo who gives it to Ali who gets 2 free throws. We attacked well the zone right away. They haven't kept the zone for long. We were fine in attack. And even when they came back down by 4 points, we didn't panic, we were united. The elders yelled at us, they were still there. When I turn those 2 crappy balls over, I got yelled at. Anyway, I can't say anything, I can't be pissed at them it would be useless, I've made 2 mistakes, I have to take it on. Flo took the initiative in making me understand I had to get the focus back :) Same with Tony. Especially in tough moments, I lost 2 beginners balls... Except from these 2 balls, I tried to be agressive and draw fouls.

In the opposite team, Popovic did a great game. But we put Yannick [Bokolo] on him and what a job he did !!! The guy still scored 1 or 2 shots in the end but Yannick pissed him so much. He did one hell of a 4th quarter, and he even put a 3 pointers that relieved us with 3 minutes remaining, after limiting Popovic. It shows everybody's ready in this team, and even people that don't play a lot are ready to bring in. It's very good for us.

And then in the locker room the atmosphere was good, but we can't stop now. Tony said to me : "I don't manage to be happy. Two years ago it was the same, we were in quarter finals too." He'll only be happy once we win the quarter finals. Same for everyone. So it's fine, we're happy but for us it's not enough. We haven't won anything we're only in quarter finals.

Anyway, the afternoon before the game was quiet. Workout, lunch, nap, snack and pre-game preparations. Nothing special happened, it was quiet. We talked quickly about blogs with Ali. He was tickled, I don't know what he's going to talk about in his next blog but well. I think he'll rather mock Boris Vladic, who's in the staff and who's Croat. He has already mentionned him.

After the game, as always, they played the song they were playing in Pau at the end of games. Everytime we win, the song is in the bus. And everytime we do that, there's Fabrice Canet, Public Relations, who takes the mike and sings. And it pisses Ronny off who yells to stop. Actually everytime we won in Pau, we had this music so we've kept the traditions, it's funny. Everyone is completely into it, docs, staff, players.

And it sounds better than when the staff is singing La Marseillaise. Actually the staff can't sing the Marseillaise, it cracks me up. Since it's not too crowded, there's not much noise in the arena and we, players we sing normal, but the staff really sings loud, and you can only hear them. And they can't sing ! And they're so off rythm, so not singing together. They suck ! It's not one in particular actually, it's the global thing, there's no harmony, they're ahead of the music, it's terrible. At the end of the song I was almost rolling on floor laughing. They have to rehearse. We're practicing for games, so they should practice for the Marseillaise, I can't believe it. But they love France, it's coming from a good place.

Anyway, with Antoine [Diot] we always watch the US Open at night before to sleep. And to be honest Federer is tough ! Nadal has fucked up : he's cut his hair, he's not wearing Capri pants anymore, he puts small shorts on, he wears polos. It's lame, Nadal equals to Capri pants, tank top, long hair and hair band ! He's not scary anymore, I'm not afraid of watching him play anymore. With Antoine, we completely root for Federer but Nadal needs to become Nadal again, he's but a shadow of his former self, it's not funny anymore. He's got shorts and a polo. He needs to show his arms again !

So here we are, we end our evenings with the US Open. I don't know how we'll handle it when it's over. In addition we don't recieve Secret Story [Big Brother] ! We're struggling. We don't manage to watch it on the Internet. I believe in this country you can't watch it on tf1.fr [french tv channel's site], we've been screwed for one week, while we where really loving it. We had TF1 in our rooms during the first round, we were chill, we could watch it every evenings. I hope we'll have it when we move out for the quarter finals...