By George Georgakopoulos

Olympiakos missed a great chance to beat Barcelona in Spain for the first time in its history as the Reds went down 76-68 on Friday for the second group stage of the Euroleague.

Had it not been for an unusually poor performance by captain Vassilis Spanoulis, who scored just two points in the second half and a total of nine throughout the game, the European champion would have capitalized on the injury to Barcelona’s best shooter, Juan Carlos Navarro, who missed almost the whole of the second half.

Barcelona was on the driving seat from start to finish, as Olympiakos had a rather poor record in attack in the first half that ended 41-32. Yet Navarro’s injury pegged the Catalans back, with Olympiakos growing ever more threatening, although it never managed to lead its host.

Although Barcelona ended the game with just one out of nine three-pointers, against Olympiakos’s seven in 18, the «Blaugrana» held on in the end aided by 10 points from former Panathinaikos guard Sarunas Jasikevicius.

Giorgos Printezis was the top scorer for the Greeks with 14 points.

This was Olympiakos’s second loss in three games in the top 16 of the competition.