FIBA officially acknowledges refereeing errors in EuroBasket / News - Basketnews.com

FIBA officially acknowledged the refereeing error in the Lithuania-Germany game and the timekeeping blunder in the Turkey-Georgia match.

Credit: FIBA Credit FIBA

After numerous players and coaches criticized EuroBasket 2022 referees, FIBA came out with an official statement acknowledging two major officiating errors during the tournament.

The official statement reads:

FIBA has acknowledged two serious errors which occurred during the Group Phase of the event.

The first one occurred during the Group B game between Lithuania and Germany when the game officials and the scorers' table failed to award a merited free-throw following a technical foul. FIBA decided that all three game officials and the game commissioner will not officiate anymore until the end of the event.

The second one was a timekeeping operation error during the game Turkey-Georgia. Following expert analysis of the precision timing system records, the conclusion is that, although the game clock had been stopped by the officials, the special device at the back of a referee uniform was activated accidentally by one of the players when the referee was trying to separate the players during an on-court incident.

FIBA also provided a message about the received criticism of the referees, which has been a constant theme throughout EuroBasket 2022 with multiple players from Mario Hezonja to Luka Doncic complaining about this part of the game.

FIBA will continue to evaluate the performance of the officials, taking all necessary measures throughout the competition, but it will equally not accept abuse of its officials before, during, and after the games. FIBA calls upon all stakeholders to safeguard a proper environment where the officials, similar to the players, can perform on the court.

EuroBasket playoffs will start on Saturday, September 10th, with a match between Turkey and France. It was recently announced that Shane Larkin will miss the remainder of the tournament due to an injury in his shooting wrist.

BasketNews invites all basketball fans to participate in a EuroBasket Playoffs Challenge where you can predict the outcome of the playoff pairs and win exclusive prizes.

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