With light traffic, it’s about a four-hour drive between Strasbourg and the Italian border, despite having to pass through Switzerland. An even shorter distance considering the possibility of taking a plane, for a route made decidedly popular by the fact that the Alsace city is the home of the European Parliament. We are talking about less than 400 km, a distance decidedly less than that which divides two very important cities for Nicola Alberani’s professional career, namely Forlì and Avellino. The place where it all began, in the world of basketball, and where it stopped talking about Italian experiences.
For five seasons, with the 2024/25 season, Alberani has been at the helm of the sports section of SIG Strasbourg, a team that will celebrate its centenary by the end of the decade and has been a regular in the French top flight for 30 years as well as an almost fixed presence in the European cups. France and Italy are historically “cousin” countries, separated by a natural border like that of the Alps. However, when it comes to sport, and basketball, the distance is not so easily traversable. “There is the difference between Earth and Pluto, it’s something you don’t believe”, Alberani tells us. “There are things that are exceptional here as aspects where we, in Italy, are special or even light years ahead.”
To best experience the transition between two realities so close and yet so distant, it was fundamental “take the best of what is here, without exaggerating compared to my Italian background. It’s an important championship, the first NBA pick has come out of here for two years, there are three Euroleague teams and last year the two Eurocup finalists came from here. There is a widespread habit on the part of NBA franchises of hiring consultants or scouts here in France because the talent is now here like in Spain or the Balkans. It is a reality that provides new stimuli all day long”.
A stimulus, for example, is represented by the fundamental difference covered by the clubs themselves compared to Italy. “In our country everything is done with pressure, attention towards the result that is missing here. They are two incomparable environments. In France, clubs are institutions, with all that this entails. Sponsors, communications, relations with the city and its entities such as schools, hospitals, in general the participation of the community in the fate of the team: all this is an important aspect here.” continues Alberani. “When you choose a player he must above all be a citizen. Winning is important, but other things are also important. In France spectators go to see institutions, in Italy the teams go to the palace to push their teams to victory.”
In concluding this passage, Alberani underlines how “lThe most important thing is to accept everything that is good here, trying to bring, to the extent that it is possible, what we do best in Italy, with more attention and drive, which here is sometimes underestimated or is not even known. . In my opinion in our country we are a bit unlucky with hardware, but we are good with software”. Another crucial observation, in understanding these differences between realities, also lies in the definition of roles. Starting with the one covered by the sport itself: “Basketball is an aspect of the club, not the appearance”.
“In Italy the one who makes the team is the most important manager”; continues, “the sporting project is what drives everything. In France there are no owners, the presidents are always elected and coordinate a head of sport and one of business. You have to intelligently try to enter a system trying to make people understand as much as possible the importance of performance, of the fact that you have to win and how important it is. In Italy we are very good at this, there is a culture of performance, of the staff, of making sure that things go as best as possible so that the ball enters which I brought here and which characterize me above all in this championship”.
Last summer, with the success of the French teams at their home Olympics in Paris, we saw how varied and colorful the scenario of team disciplines is in the country beyond the Alps. Playing basketball in France involves having to share the spotlight with high competition, and Strasbourg is no exception: “Since we are spectators and not fans, we tend to participate in all the sports that represent your city, to give great dignity to all team sports. There are working conditions that allow all of this, it is a world where jobs are created. There is ice hockey in Strasbourg which has a coach in his 31st season, where does something like this exist in Italy? It’s more that when you’re one of them you really are one. The result is important, but there are coaches who are relegated and start again the following year. Sometimes I feel that I am from the moon or that they are there. We are a top team in an environment where you have to try to make important things understood, always with gratitude because the context puts you in the best conditions to do your job”, underlines Alberani. “It’s not all black or all white, you have to be ready to make important sacrifices. When you go abroad you are always a guest, it requires an incredible spirit of adaptation”.
The NBA has taken care of reiterating the French centrality in European basketball in recent years. Thanks to the Wembanyama factor, the overseas league’s attention on the transalpine championship has increased dramatically and this coincides with a continuous production of players at the highest level. “Here you truly feel at the center of the world”, Alberani tells us. “We have a boy like Dessert and there are teams that have already come to see him several times by December 1st. You see the attention to the players, a project like Insep, in general the common feeling of contributing to something big. The reality is that the NBA is just around the corner. In Italy there is no production like this and the NBA is seen as if it were on the other side of the ocean, in France it is already here. We can have some good generations, but here everyone is strong, it is genetic production at very high levels. And I don’t know to what extent a project like INSEP can be fully implemented in Italy”.
