This Saturday, on March 18, Astana will have a game on the road in the VTB United League against the Riga «VEF».
 
After the victory in the Cup of Kazakhstan, the team is in excellent spirits and in good shape. After arriving in Astana, the team managed to train for a couple of days at home and again leaved for another game.
 
The team from Riga on the 8th line, right after « Astana» in the tournament table, with the result of 8 wins and 9 losses. Our club has already met with Latvian team this season on the home court of  »Astana», then in a fierce struggle «Astana» won with a score of 66:64. This match is very important for both teams, and especially for «Astana» so that at least to remain on the 7th place, or even move up to the 6th position.
 
Latvian team has a good balanced team with American and local players. The well-known players not only from the Latvian national team, but also from Europe play in “VEF”. Guard of «VEF» Janis Blums, is so familiar to our club, as in the season of 2013/2014he defended the colors of the Kazakhstan team, which not once brought victory to the team.
 
Head coach of «Astana» Ilias Papatheodorou told how the preparations for the match are going:
- We’ll have a difficult game, «VEF» is a very strong, close-knit team that works particularly well in defense. We need to act with maximum concentration and maximum energy if we expect victory in this match.

The game will be held on March 18 in Riga, the broadcast of the match is available live on the website of the VTB United League at 21:00 pm, as well as on the channel «KazSport» on March 19 at 17:35 pm.
 

The Latvian VEF won the Kazakhstan «Astana» in Riga — 65:57 (14:13, 11:11, 18:17, 22:16).
 
The game of two neighbours in the standings, closing the Top-8, was intense, and the teams went neck to neck. VEF came started the fourth quarter with a symbolic advantage of 2 points, but at the right time, the scoring brigade of the Latvians united their power. Janis Blums first got the right to three free shots, and then Gints Antrops twice scored from behind the arc. Christopher Richard and Arnas Labutskas supported this impulse with new three-pointers. The successful shots gave the hosts double-digit advantage, but the hail of three-pointers continued: two sharp shots by Blums! «Astana» desperately struggled, but it was impossible to cope with the deadly Latvian shooters. The victory over the “Astana” allowed VEF to get advance in the table not only of Kazakhs but of «Yenisei» as well.
 
The top scorers:
 
VEF: Yanis Blims (18 + 6 rebounds), Christopher Richard (15), Martins Meiers (9 + 10 rebounds).
 
«Astana»: Robert Lowery (16), Roderick Odom (14), Ian Miller (8 + 5 rebounds).
 
VEF head coach Janis Gailitis:

– I’m grateful to my players. They struggled today. That’s why we won the rebounding game, which secured our victory. We played good defence. Something didn’t work in offence, but we shot when we needed it most. We took advantage of Astana problems, when their leaders got into foul pit. As a result, we were fresh in the 4th quarter and were able to finally win.

«Astana» head coach Ilias Papatheodorou:
– We expected a tough game. We knew how good our opponent was. The problem was that we played in the Kazakhstan Cup last week, and our foreign players didn't take part, which cooled the guys a bit. But VEF hit tough shots in crucial moments today. Their leader Janis Blums played a big role in their win. We were ready for that, but couldn’t respond properly. We have four more games and will try to get on top in it.
  
«Astana» will hold the next game on its court, on March 25 and 26.  The capital team will host «Barsy Atyrau« in the frames of National League of Kazakhstan.