Thomas Schreiner, a love story in the country of the Pyrenees
Back in what was his gateway to the LEB Oro League ten years ago, the Austrian Thomas Schreiner has starred this summer in one of the most “romantic” signings in the competition. A true team player whose experience in the category could become the main cog in a MoraBanc Andorra willing to repeat their joint history.
PABLO ROMERO / COMMUNICATION AREA FEB
It was the 2012/13 season when Francesc Solana signed up the first project of his MoraBanc Andorra in the LEB Gold League with the union of two players of Austrian origin and, in both cases, unknown to the fan.
The first of them was the young shooting guard Anton Maresch who had joined the team a year earlier and the second, a Thomas Schreiner who at 25 years of age set out to live his first adventure away from Austrian basketball. A piece that ended up becoming one of the most profitable signings of an institution in which they spent up to five seasons, thus turning his heart into a tricolor.
That is why it is really easy to understand that, at this point in his career, Thomas has decided to set course again for a country without which he would not have been the same. A place where the pressure of promotion will walk hand in hand with him on a day-to-day basis and where his experience will be decisive in being able to guide the dressing room.
Because not every day does one have the opportunity to incorporate a player of the stature of Thomas Schreiner who will make a difference both on and off the court.
Thomas Schreiner: “When it is your people who call you, the heart decides for you”
He arrived just a few days ago and did so a few days ahead of the start date of the preseason, but it was no wonder. Because Thomas Schreiner was going to reunite with his family in one of the most special places of his career, an Andorra La Vella that he left behind in 2017 and to which he now returns as a much more mature player. A situation that alone explains the smile with which this Austrian guard received us on Thursday afternoon…
Thomas, who was going to tell us that this year we were going to see you again heading to Andorra…
“If I’m honest, I think it’s something that I couldn’t even have imagined just a few weeks ago… I finished the season very focused on being able to win as many games as possible with ICG Força Lleida and being able to go far in the Final Four and, when it is finished, we do not expect much beyond being able to rest a few days. Soon the possibility of coming to Andorra again arose and for me it was a very difficult decision, but at the same time a very simple one. Difficult because it meant leaving behind a place like Lleida where they had treated me really well, but simple because when your people call you, the heart has no doubts when deciding”.
How does the possibility of returning arise? From whose mouth did you get the news?
“The first one who calls me is Francesc Solana and it is he who conveys to me the affection of the club and the interest they have in his return. Next, President Gorka Aixàs called me again to see how they could help me make the decision and what I might need to feel comfortable with it. With those kinds of details you realize that the club loves you, that it respects you and that its desire for you to come back is sincere. You feel that they are your people and that, therefore, there is no reason not to be able to come back here.”
More than a question of project or money, it was a sentimental decision…
“Without a doubt, because Andorra has always been a very special place for me. They gave me the first opportunity to play in a League like the LEB Oro ten years ago and that allowed me to grow as a player with them. So, he has always been very grateful to them. Together we built a project, together we achieved promotion, together we played a Copa del Rey, together we played some Playoffs… That’s why I felt that, if they needed my help at this time, I couldn’t refuse”.
How has the Thomas Schreiner of 2012 changed from the one we will be able to see in this 2022?
“In many things because ten years have passed and that is a period of time that marks you a lot personally. At that time he was a boy barely 25 years old and he arrived wanting to be able to come to a world that he did not know much about. Now it is not that you know him very well (laughs), but I am a more mature person, with a family and a daughter, which makes your life change a lot. On the track, I would tell you that it hasn’t changed that much. Obviously, I have much more experience than when I came here, but I’m still that player whose priority is none other than being able to help his teammates win games. I have always been a team player and that has been the case regardless of the years”.
Burgos, Bilbao, Austria, Lleida… Five very intense years since you left the Principality!
“Without a doubt, because I also have really special memories of each one of those places and that will mean that over time I won’t forget any of them. In Burgos I met who is now my wife, in Bilbao I enjoyed a wonderful city and fans that welcomed me really well, in Austria I returned to enjoy my home and in Lleida I found the most beautiful moment with the birth of my daughter Naomi in a historic season. It has been five years throughout the world, but in which I have been enriching myself as a person before being able to return to Andorra a little older”.
You knew the country, the league, the club, but not Natxo Lezkano. What impressions does the new technician give you in your first contact?
“That’s how it is. Until now we had not coincided in any team, but we did know each other from having faced each other on many occasions during all these years. He proposed to me the type of project he had in mind and offered me a different roll than the one I had had during these last few seasons, but I was very clear that I wanted to come back here and that for that I was going to adapt to any type of roll that the coach could ask me. I think I can be an important player when it comes to helping the team, contributing to the dressing room and making the most of every minute I have on the court, be it 5 or 20. I’m always ready to give my best and this time will not be an exception.
From starting in an ICG Força Lleida in which you had to take on many minutes, to the competition of a MoraBanc Andorra in which you will have to fight for them with Rafa Luz and Micah Speight… how do you get on with that?
“With great calm because that means that we have a long squad to be able to opt for the objectives. None of us arrived here thinking about the minutes or the leading role that we are going to have, but about being able to give our best to the team in order to win as many games as possible. I think we have a very balanced team, with a lot of people who can contribute things and in which there will be opportunities for everyone”.
Of course, the club has made it clear from the beginning that the objective will be to be able to opt for promotion…
“Exactly, but for that we will have to win many games and, to do so, we will have to go step by step. I think that everyone’s mind is being able to return to the ACB, but in this League you don’t go up in December, but you have to start doing a good job from the preseason to get to the start of the League in the best possible shape. From there, there are many factors that come into play such as dynamics, rivals, injuries… It’s a long road, so we shouldn’t think about much more than what we have in front of us at all times”.
You have been pointed out both from the outside as the main candidate for promotion that perhaps the fact that we could be facing one of the toughest editions of the League in years has not been sufficiently valued…
“I am totally convinced of it. I think that the level of this LEB Oro will be really high and that there will be no easy games. On paper, the squads make us see that we are going to find really strong teams and that each one of them is going to require a great effort from us in order to win. It’s going to be a very nice competition for the fans to watch, but it’s really hard for the coaches and players”.
Those words… They smell like the experience of someone who learned a lot from the LEB Oro between 2012 and 2014!
“Well, I think that those first two years in the LEB Oro were very valuable for the club and that now they can be a good base when it comes to facing the new season. The first year we came from being promoted from the LEB Plata, we were a very young team and we were not in any pool but, even so, we stayed at the gates of promotion. That season taught us to value the things we had done well and to learn about those other things that had not been so positive. That was the key to successfully trying again the following year. Now the path is similar, although we know that a certain pressure will accompany us because promotion is no longer a goal but rather a necessity, having been a team that has already been at the top and has fallen. We will have to learn to live with it so that it does not affect us on a day-to-day basis and so that it ends up being more of a motivation towards a goal that makes us all feel special”.
In these first days in Andorra, do you notice the warmth of the people again?
“Yes. From the first day I have been meeting fans who stop me on the street or in stores to convey their love. They convey their joy to me because I have returned to the project and they make me see that they are very excited because we can try again They are already making me feel at home so, for them, we are going to try again”.
Somehow, that first LEB team was also to blame for Andorra recovering that passion for basketball that you now feel in its streets…
“Of course, because we were a humble team, that came from the LEB Plata and that nobody counted on… If you look at that squad now, you might think that it was a great team, but at that time, we were a very young team that they came to Just 500 people. As the months went by we earned the affection of the people, we were more and more fans to see each other and in that first League final against Lucentum Alicante we managed to fill the pavilion. That was the beginning of everything and the key for Andorra to recover that enthusiasm for basketball that has always existed in the country”.
And Thomas Schreiner? What do you ask basketball for in this new stage?
“Well, as I was saying before, I have always been a player who has tried to give everything for the team. Little by little the years go by, but I think now is the time to enjoy the track, to help the team win and that in a few months it will be our job that takes us to one place or another. I don’t think much further or what could happen in a specific time, but what each moment holds for us. But as I say, always enjoying basketball”.
season stats -Thomas Schreiner:
COMPLETE SHEET
Games played: 39
Minutes: 28.11
Points: 7.1
Rebounds: 3.3
Attendance: 4.5
Recoveries: 1.1
plugs: —
Fouls received: 1.7
Rating: 10.2
Sports career – Thomas Schreiner:
Inferior categories: Dragons Chin Min UBC St. Pölten (Austria)
2004/06: Dragons Chin Min UBC St. Pölten (Austria)
2006/07: BSC Raiffeisen PanthersFürstenfeld (Austria)
2007/11: Dragons Chin Min UBC St. Pölten (Austria)
2011/12: ECE bulls Kapfenberg (Austria)
2012/14: River Andorra MoraBanc (LEB Gold)
2014/17: MoraBanc Andorra (Endesa League)
2017/18: San Pablo Burgos (Endesa League)
2018/19: RETAbet Bilbao Basket (LEB Gold)
2019/20: RETAbet Bilbao Basket (Endesa League)
2020/21: ECE bulls Kapfenberg (Austria)
2021/22: ICG Force Lleida (LEB Gold)
2022/23: MoraBanc Andorra (LEB Gold)