The Russian Euroleague basketball clubs (Zenit St. Petersburg, Kazan and CSKA Moscow) and the Eurocup (Krasnodar) were definitively excluded from these competitions for the 2021-2022 season and their results canceled, the organizers announced this Tuesday.
As a result of the invasion of the Russian army in Ukraine, which began on February 24, the court decided on February 28 to suspend Russian teams from European club competitions.
The court has gone further and this Tuesday decided to cancel the results “because the situation in Ukraine is not developing favorably”.
As a result of this decision, the final standings of the Euroleague regular season will be established after the last matches that will be played in mid-April with 15 teams involved instead of the 18 that started the tournament. Therefore, the standings will be established with the results of 28 matches and not 34.
This modifies the qualifying race for the play-offs, which will be played by the top eight finishers. For example, it will hurt Monaco, which had won five of the six matches played against the Russian teams, and will benefit Bayern Munich, who had not won any of the three matches.
In the new Euroleague standings, FC Barcelona remains in the lead with 19 victories, one more than Real Madrid.
There are four rounds left in the regular league, in addition to eight other matches that were postponed in their day as a result of covid-19.
tba/mcd/dr